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Boo]\5 b^ IfDenrp Mart) Beecber. 

Bible Studies. 

Sunday Evening Discourses on Inspiration, and Bible Readings, 
with Characteristic Comment. A new volume from unpublished 
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Garnet cloth, $1.50. 

A Book of Prayer. 

Introduction on the universality and varied phases of Prayer. 
Invocation, Prayers before Sermon, and Closing Prayers arranged 
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[1892]. Cloth, 75 cts.; cloth, gilt^^i. 

Comforting Thoughts. 

For those in Bereavement, Illness and Adversity. Compiled by 
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On Slavery, Civil War (including the Speeches in England, 1S63), 
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Royal Truths. 

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BIBLE STUDIES 



READINGS IX THE EARLY HOOKS OF THE OLD 

TESTAMENT, WITH F'AMILIAR COMMENT, 

GIVEN IN 1878-9 



HENRY WARD BEECHER 



EDITED 
FROM STENOGRAPHIC NOTES OF T, J, ELLINWOOD 



JOHN R. HOWARD 






NEW YORK 

FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT 

1893 

^ ^ ^ I. 



^ 






Copyright, in 1892, 
By T. J. KLLINWOOD. 



H 



PREFACE. 



The lectures on the early Old Testament books con- 
tained in this volume were delivered in Plymouth Church, 
on Sunday evenings, during the autumn, winter, and spring 
of 1878-79, and were given, it may be presumed, in accord- 
ance with a comprehensive plan, cherished by Mr. Beecher, 
which included the desire, repeatedly expressed by him, 
that he might find opportunity to preach a course of ser- 
mons on the later historical books, the Prophets, and the 
Psalms. That this desire was not realized cannot but be 
deeply regretted by those who are aware of the power and 
skill of Mr. Beecher as an expositor of Scripture, and who 
therefore can form some conception of how he would have 
handled those topics, and especially the themes suggested 
by the matchless hymns of David. 

These Lectures were not published immediately after 
their delivery, because at that time a series of Mr. Beech- 
er's morning sermons was being issued in his paper, the 
Christian Union; but, following my usual custom as re- 
porter of his utterances, I preserved full stenographic notes 
of them. It was evident that a more than transient pur- 
pose actuated their author in giving them forth, and from 
the first I felt that they ought not to be allowed to perish. 
After Mr. Beecher's death this feeling took on the form of 
a conviction of duty, which has resulted in their prepa- 
ration for the press ; and they are now, with the consent 
and approval of the family of Mr. Beecher, offered to the 
public. 

It is probable that of the many hundreds of reported dis- 
courses of Henry Ward Beecher no series could be selected 

iii 



4 PREFACE. 

that would be perused with greater interest or profit than 
these " Bible Studies." 

The present time, when there is such widespread and 
earnest attention paid to the study of the Scriptures, would 
seem most opportune for the appearance of this work ; and 
it is sent out in the hope that through its instrumentality 
multitudes will be led to a better understanding of the 
Word of God, and a greater love and reverence for it. 

T. J. ELLINWOOD. 



INTRODUCTION, 



BY THE EDITOR. 



Probably the thing which will most surprise those who for 
the first time have knowledge of these Bible Studies will be their 
modern spirit. The world of scholarship, criticism, and theolog- 
ical thought moves fast when once it starts ; and since 1878, when 
these lectures were delivered, great advances have been made, 
especially in the larger freedom of utterance which men of rever- 
ent love for the Bible and of lives consecrated to the service of 
God deem it their duty to take. The necessity laid upon them 
by the new philosophies of the divine methods — 

" That to the height of this great argument 
[They] may assert eternal Providence, 
And justify the ways of God to men," 

— has driven them into bolder denial of the mechanical theo- 
ries of inspiration ; the amanuensis-theories of Bible-writing ; and 
the infantile conceptions of the ancient Hebrews concerning their 
national deity, Jehovah, as binding upon the faith and conscience 
of men after two thousand years' study of the ampler revelations 
made by "Jesus, the Christ of God." 

Popular hostile critics of Christianity have found their chief 
success in holding it responsible for a belief in every statement of 
these artless, childlike records as indubitable facts, and in ex- 
hibiting the savage cruelties committed by the early Israelites 
under "immediate divine commandment" as inconsistent with 
the professed teachings of Christ ; thus claiming a demonstration 
that neither the Old Testament nor the New is of divine authority, 
since they stand as one, and both cannot be true. And foolish 
Christians, in captivity to the form of sound words as to "all 
Scripture" being "given by inspiration of God" have largely 
accepted this cunning dilemma, and contended earnestly for the 
faith once delivered to the saints. Of late years, however, phi- 
lology, literary criticism, and the study of the past with an ever- 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

widening sense of historical perspective, have changed the views 
of scholars; and — especially during the past five years — have 
resulted in diffusing an entirely new atmosphere, enabling those 
who are not scholars to comprehend something of the divine 
methods of creation by growth, in things spiritual and in the 
mental, moral, and social nature of man as well as in the physical 
world. So that, although the views of these Bible Studies will 
not be new to scholars or to those of the laity who keep abreast 
of the times, they will be almost novel to a multitude of devout 
Bible students, while full of fresh suggestion and invigorating 
thought even to those who have long held the same position. 

Moreover, their especial value lies along the line not of destruc- 
tion but of conservation. As a Presbyterian minister wrote to 
Mr. Beecher just after the issue of his volume of sermons on 
" Evolution and Religion " : — 

"It seems to me you keep all the most choice and precious things, 
only placing them on the right foundation ; and how they can stand much 

longer on the old foundation I do not see Surely your book 

will bring light to many." 

The whole force of these lectures goes to throw off the cramp- 
ing theory of " inspiration " which makes God responsible for all 
the evil that was done by the inchoate Hebrew people in his 
name. Thus the student is left free to follow this master exposi- 
tor in rediscovering and newly appreciating the wisdom, the 
goodness, the grand foundation-work of Moses under the Divine 
impulse, which both served to build up the Israelitish nation 
and has entered into many of the soundest elements of modern 
civilization. To quote another opinion as to the "Evolution and 
Religion " : " Many will owe to this illumination no less than the 
renewal of a lost belief." 

Whoever will at this date read Mr. Beecher's sermons and 
addresses in the time of our Civil War will not only be moved by 
their eloquence, he will be interested and surprised at their solid 
conservatism. In the realm of civil polity as well as in that of 
religion and theology, the man vv^rought out his own noble, gener- 
ous, honest, essentially just nature ; and, when he found what he 
believed to be truth, flamed it out upon his fellow men with the 
effective contagion of human sympathy and an unwavering faith 
in God and the goodness of God's ways. 

There must have been a mighty satisfaction dwelling in the 
soul of such a man-helper as Henry Ward Beecher. Despite the 
innumerable criticisms breaking upon him from ever)^ quarter,— 



INTR on UC TION. 7 

some, just, which he tried to heed ; the most, unjust, which he 
regarded much as boys do snowballs in a winter fight, — through- 
out his entire life he was inspirited by a continuous acclaim of 
gratitude, many- voiced as the ocean, from men and women who 
gladly owned to him their debts of deliverance from darkness and 
spiritual captivity. Amid the buffets of blame, which no man of 
such abounding activity would expect to escape, he received 
also unstinted praise and outspoken admiration. This doubtless 
pleased him, for, though not a vain man, he was an amiable one. 

But neither praise nor blame weighed much with him. His 
whole being was devoted to serving his kind. And the solid fact 
— based upon the ceaseless testimonies of thousands during 
twenty, thirty, forty, fifty years, as his public life went on — 
that he was successfully doing what God had inspired him with 
the desire to do, must have brought to him a supreme content- 
ment ; must have been a part of that astonishing reserve of spirit- 
ual power, that kept his head erect and his face serene while his 
pulpit work went on with increased richness and effectiveness, in 
the midst of troubles that should seemingly have crushed him. 

The particular series of Sunday evening talks about the early 
books of the Old Testament which form the present volume, given 
in the winter and spring of 1878-9, were taken down stenograph- 
ically as they fell from Mr. Beecher's lips, by Mr. T. J. Ellinwood 
— for nearly thirty years his special reporter. While going over 
them in preparation for the press, I have been impressed with 
the feeling that in Mr. Ellinwood's heart, too, there must be a 
large portion of satisfaction, in the fact that his keen sense, 
intelligent appreciation, and skillful hand have been the means 
of preserving to the world the chief part of Mr. Beecher's public 
ministrations, during their most eventful and influential period. 
It is due to Mr. Ellinwood to say that, while, great numbers of 
Mr. Beecher's sermons, lectures, prayer-meeting talks, public 
addresses, etc., were reported by him as a matter of business 
engagement, either with Mr. Beecher or his publishers, there 
were a multitude of others that he took down for the mere pleas- 
ure of takingthem, and in the hope that at some time they would be 
used. The present series were among this latter class ; and surely, 
those who read them, and who find them a torch of new light in 
exploring the decried or forgotten treasures of the Old Testament 
Scriptures, will not overlook the debt they owe to the man who 
caught them in the air, and gave them to the "art preservative " 
fourteen years after their utterance. 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

Mr. Beecher, without dispraising any other reports of his ser- 
mons, grew unwilling to be held responsible for any except Mr. 
Ellinwood's, and so wrote at the time of the establishment of 
" Plymouth Pulpit," the weekly pamphlet edition of his sermons, 
in 1868. This was after ten years of experience with Mr. Ellin- 
wood's reporting of his rapid and often irregular outpourings. 

The discourses of the present volume are not sermons, — except- 
ing the two in the front of the volume, one on " Inspiration of the 
Bible " and one on " How to read the Bible." They are in fact 
Bible readings, interspersed with comment in most free and fa- 
miliar fashion. In the preparation of them for the press, many 
careless colloquialisms and repetitions have been elided ; itera- 
tions of Mr. Beecher's view of inspiration, and recapitulations of 
its bearings on the history, — necessary in addressing congregations 
containing many different people from week to week, but surplus- 
age in a connected printing of the whole series, — have been 
omitted ; here and there, incomplete statements of his views, 
thrown out hastily and liable to misconstructions, have been re- 
inforced from other and more careful statements made by the 
author elsewhere ; and some of his interpretations, which to the 
old-style reader might seem almost irreverent, or at least " ration- 
alistic," in their reduction of a passage to a common-sense mean- 
ing, have been confirmed by foot-note references to the text or 
margins of the Revised Version of the Old Testament, which 
was not published until six or seven years (A. D. 1885) after the 
delivery of these discourses. 

In all this, however, scrupulous care has been taken not to mar 
or interfere with the spirit or essential form of the author's utter- 
ances, but to keep well within the line of revision pursued through 
many years under Mr. Beecher's own eye, and subject to his 
direction, in others of his lectures, sermons, and books. 

The attentive reader of these Bible Studies will lose no living 
belief in the ancient Scriptures as containing the Word of God 
to men, while he will gain new and larger views of their worth for 
Christian life to-day — and that, not in spite of the new philosophy 
of growth, but in full harmony with its irresistible advance, 

JOHN R. HOWARD. 

N'ew Yorky December ^ 1892. 



CONTENTS. 



Preface, 
Introduction, 

I. The Inspiration of the Bible, 

II. How TO Read the Bible, 

III. The Book of Beginnings, 

IV. Abraham, 
V. Isaac, 

VI. Jacob, 

VII. Jacob and Joseph, 

VIII. Joseph, . 

IX. Moses, 

X. Emancipation, 

XI. The Wilderness and Sinai, 

XII. The Sabbath, 

XIII. Mosaic Institutes: Humanity, 

XIV. Mosaic Institutes: The Household, 
XV. Mosaic Institutes : Social Observances, 

XVI. The Feast of Tabernacles, 

XVII. In the Land of Moab, 

XVIII. Campaigns of Joshua, 

XIX. A Time of Degradation, - 

XX. Gideon, .... 

XXI. Jephthah, .... 

XXII. Samson 

XXIII. Naomi and Ruth, 



PAGE 

3 

5 

II 

31 
47 
65 
83 
103 
125 

145 
163 

185 
205 
229 
248 
267 
281 
297 

315 
332 
351 
367 
383 
400 
420 



IX 



I. 
THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE. 



" But now we are delivered from the Law, that being dead wherein we 
were held ; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the old- 
ness of the letter." — Rom. vii. 6. 



For the general purpose of bringing home especially the 
more ancient of the Hebrew Scriptures to your considera- 
tion and your confidence, unembarrassed by the theories 
which have been given and which turn the Bible very 
largely into a book of disputes, I purpose, in this series of 
Sunday evening lectures, first, to discuss somewhat the 
meaning of "inspiration," as applied to this source of our 
faith, and then to go over with you the chief historical 
books of the Old Testament, trying to find what there is 
in them for us of the modern day. 

Good and scholarly men have taken the declaration that 
"all Scripture is given by inspiration of God," and given 
to it what I think is an erroneous construction. I hold 
inspiration to be a fundamental fact; but they have pro- 
ceeded to form a theory of inspiration, not out of the 
Word of God, but out of their own idea of the action of 
God upon the human soul. Then they have brought that 
theory forward as a criterion by which to interpret the 
Bible; and when facts have confronted it and seemed to 
contradict it, they have been tempted to go into a wrest- 
ling with and a wrenching of those facts, and to adopt a 
system which is inconsistent with all fairness, all straight- 
forwardness, and all honesty. To a very large extent in 
our own time men have been deterred from reading the 



Sunday evening, November 3, 1878. 



12 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Word of God; some by disgust at what seemed to them 
dislionest methods of interpretation; and some by despair 
because they could make nothing of i-t, as taught. 

Look at the way in which this book is held, by thou- 
sands and thousands in the community, w4th abject indif- 
ference ! It is as if it were not, so far as they are con- 
cerned. They have no curiosity, no appetite that leads 
them to desire the Word of God. And many of those that 
have a desire for it are thrown back from it when they see 
what are the methods of interpretation which are brought 
to bear upon it. Some men spiritualize every part of it, as 
if it were all a book of symbols, not carrying its true mean- 
ing in the letter and upon the face of it; as if it merely 
prefigured something outside of itself. Other men exactly 
reverse this, and give a literal interpretation to every part 
of the Bible ; they unspiritualize it and degrade it by 
carrying men toward matter. Still others (and I am sorry 
to say that among them are men who have been much 
blessed by reason of their zeal and appetite for doing good) 
have been very pernicious in their influence upon the 
popular acceptation of the Word of God, their method 
being to give a spiritual interpretation to every material 
fact and a material interpretation to every spiritual fact, 
and so to work it both ways out of the range of ordinary 
reason, and put it beyond the operation of common sense, 
by which men are guided in the household, in the affairs of 
business, and in matters of State. 

Now, if the Word of God is ever to be as powerful as it 
ought to be among men it must have an interpretation 
that will bring it home to the bosoms of men, so that 
they shall understand it as they understand any great and 
important truths in human life; and instead of imitating 
those who first form a theory of inspiration and then 
undertake to make the Bible conform to it, we must go 
humbly to the Word of God and see how it is made up, 
and ask what the facts are, and then out of the facts form 
a theory of inspiration — for I hold that the Bible was writ- 
ten by inspired writers. Everything that is in it, looked at 



THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE. 1 3 

exactly as it is, without perversion, must go to make up 
our theory of what inspiration admits or includes in itself. 

I pass by briefly the definition of " revelation," which is 
making known to men things not known before. 

As to the Word of God itself, it does not claim to be a 
book of revelations. It contains revelations; but at first it 
did not stand on that ground, nor did it base its authority 
thereon. Indeed, there are very few revelations, as such, in 
the Bible. There are records innumerable of things that 
men at large had not found out, but that they were capa- 
ble of finding out. Men were told in the Word of God 
much valuable truth, as a child is told by its mother, for 
the sake of early instruction, many useful things that it has 
not yet learned, but that are within its reach. In a certain 
sense revelations may consist in disclosures of things which 
lie within the sphere of a man's reason. And at particular 
periods of the world, and for special purposes in the con- 
duct of human affairs, it has pleased God to make extra- 
ordinary revelations, through extraordinary men, unfold- 
ing to men at large things which they did not know, and 
which they could not find out in the then stage of the 
world, but which afterwards, when they came to investi- 
gate, were plain and easy for them to comprehend. 

Men laugh and say, " If we can ascertain such things by 
natural reason, what is the use of revelation ? " Of course, if 
the race were to wait long enough, they could find out many 
things that were revealed in the Scriptures ; but for purposes 
of education these things were wisely made known in the 
childhood of mankind. Beneficently, with a view to man's 
earlier development, some things were anticipated to which 
men would evidently have come if they had been let alone. 

And yet, there are some things that human reason of 
itself could not compass; as, for instance, the nature of 
God, the character of the other life, the destiny of man, 
and the great moral principles on which God administers 
his government in this world. These are spiritual ele- 
ments that men unaided cannot understand. I do not 
undertake to say that men may not, in later periods of 



14 BIBLE STUDIES. 

large and multifarious knowledge and by scientific meth- 
ods, arrive at right conclusions in regard to these elements 
also; but there are now many questions which no man can 
fathom except by the light which is thrown upon them by 
revelation. Because there are things revealed that are 
within the reach of men's investigations, it does not follow 
that there are not other things revealed which are beyond 
the pale of human research. 

But revelation is the smallest part of the Word of God. 
There is far less of it than of narrative and of history. 
Divine inspiration educed the material, and men "spake 
as they were moved by the Spirit " — that is, under the 
inspiration of holy feelings they were competent to record 
with substantial accuracy the experiences that sprang from 
the influence of the divine mind upon the human mind. 
For inspiration is something much broader than revela- 
tion. It may be very generally defined as being a divine 
influence that quickens the faculties of men. Whether it 
acts directly upon individual hum.an minds (I believe it 
does, at times); whether it acts indirectly upon the human 
mind through institutions (and I believe it does that also); 
or whether it inspires mankind at large with a knoudedge 
of the truth or with the light of truth, — it is an action of 
the divine mind upon the human mind, either in the mass 
or as individuals, so as to secure — What? Such a presen- 
tation of the truth as shall work toward morality and spirit- 
ualized manhood. 

The whole drift of the Bible is to be a practical book — a 
book to teach men the highest way of life; to teach them 
how to live so as not to be degraded by their senses; so 
that they shall be able to meet the inequalities of life; so 
that it shall be possible for them to use the world without 
abusing it; to teach them how to live in this world so that 
they shall come to a higher and better one. If there ever 
was a book the aim of whose teaching was that the man 
of God might be thoroughly furnished unto every good 
work, that book is the Bible — as we commonly call this 
collection of ancient sacred Scriptures. 



THE INSPIRA TION OF THE BIBLE. 1 5 

Now, let us see what Inspiration, as it is derived from 
an examination of the Book itself, must include. There is 
an impression that in the larger understanding of inspira- 
tion there is a limitation of the interpretation of God's 
Word; on the contrary, I believe that the larger liberty 
gives the larger power. 

First : Any adequate theory of inspiration must admit 
of the incorporation of all existing records into the Word. 
Genesis, in its earlier chapters, unquestionably was made 
effulgent with the combination of several then-existing 
records of things. They are very plainly marked in the 
original. The whole style and the whole use of language 
demarks them one from another. So, at the very first step 
into the Bible we find that inspiration, as it were, gathers 
up documents, statements of fact, that existed before, and 
makes them part and parcel of the inspired record; and 
that with which the Word of God begins it goes on with. 
Whole books were selections from existing literature. 
There is no question but that the book of Esther was taken 
bodily out of the records of an Oriental monarch. With- 
out doubt the ten genealogies came from the public rec- 
ords, made just as any other genealogical records are — 
just as the public documents in Brooklyn are made, that 
are in the hands of the county clerk, and of which one 
might make a transcript. And so many existing docu- 
ments were brought together in the making up of the 
Bible that, if it was produced under inspiration, we must 
see that inspiration admitted — nay, directed — the taking 
into the Word of God much of the literature that had 
sprung up in the ordinary course of human thought and 
procedure. 

Then, secondly: Inspiration, to be applicable to the Bible 
as we have it, must admit the incorporation of statements, 
in regard to incidental facts, which originated in the 
usual faulty, errant operation of the human mind. If any 
theory of inspiration admitted such inaccuracy as viti- 
ated moral principles, and misled men as to conduct, as to 
disposition, and as to great spiritual tendencies, it would 



1 6 BIBLE STCDIKS. 

be fatal to every scheme for the elevation of men to which 
it might be applied; but inspiration is consistent with such 
a presentation of solid truths as is adapted to the welfare 
of the human race, while yet this presentation is made 
through vehicles that carry with them the limitations and 
imperfections of human language and human thought, not 
only, but also the peculiar characteristics of the period, the 
nation, and the man inspired to declare it. We do not 
destroy the moral purpose of a document when we show 
that it is misspelled, or that there are literary or statistical 
mistakes in it, provided the mistakes are quite irrelevant 
to the main end. It is destructive of any theory of the 
inspiration of the Bible to claim that every word and letter 
which it contains is infallibly correct. That claim, carried 
out logically or consistently, would do one of two things: 
it would destroy the Bible itself, in the faith of just- 
minded men and honest-minded interpreters; or it would 
put men on a system of twisting and twirling metaphorical 
statements. It would lead to discriminations which would 
make men special theorists, and result in erroneous judg- 
ments on their part. Indeed, it has resulted in just that. 

To say that there were " ten thousand " when there were 
only five thousand does not invalidate the practical intent 
of conveying the fact that there were a great viany. The 
use of specific numbers to indicate a strong statement of 
a large number is thoroughly Oriental, and natural in an 
Oriental book. To say that there was a flood of forty 
days if it lasted only twenty days does not disprove the 
fact that there was a great cataclysm or phenomenon of 
nature, lasting an unusually long time. This does vitiate 
a theory of inspiration which makes every figure in the 
Bible accurate, which spells every word right, and which 
places every element in its correct place: but the record 
itself disputes any such theory of inspiration as that; for 
that would hold it morally responsible for inaccuracies, 
misstatements which are contained in the record, and 
would make the whole thing false in respect to the great 
moral ends for which any communication is made. 



THE INSPIRA TION OF THE BIBLE. ij 

If it be said that one man, in writing- a portion of the 
Scriptures, said one thing, while the opposite was said by 
another, that may be an utterly unimportant error. It is 
stated in one of the Gospels that Christ went to Nazareth 
before certain events happened, and by another it is 
declared that he went after the happening of those events; 
but what difference does it make whether he went before 
or after? He itcnt. If the theory of inspiration insists 
that exactitude as to facts is indispensable to its divine 
origin, then it makes a great deal of difference; but if the 
theor}^ of inspiration takes no note of incidental errors pro- 
vided they do not vitiate the great purpose which divine 
truth was intended to bring forth, then it does not amount 
to any difference. At any rate, no man can critically exam- 
ine the text of the Old Testament and the New and not 
find these internal and external vehicular inaccuracies; 
and I take the ground that the true theory of inspiration 
admits of those incidental errors of time, place, etc., which 
do not alter the general drift of the text, nor the impres- 
sion it was designed to make on men, the object being to 
"thoroughly furnish them for every good work." A truth 
may be valid, and yet be clothed with imperfect views and 
erroneous statements, and even urged upon low grounds. 

" Honor thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the 
land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." 

What is the drift of this passage? Is it to teach men 
how to live a great while? No. People want to live a 
great wdiile, anyhow. That does not indicate inspiration. 
That is inherent. The drift of the passage is Honor thy 
father and thy mother; and the motive applied was, com- 
paratively speaking, a low one; but it was probably the 
only motive by which, in the early ages of the human race, 
children could be touched in a way to make them treat 
their parents with filial reverence. A great thing lon- 
gevity was thought to be ; and there was a distinction 
made between the length of days of those who honored 
their father and mother and those who disregarded them. 
It was not the highest motive ; nor, for us, could it be the 

2 



1 8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

true one: but, for the slaves just escaped out of Egypt, it 
was wise. 

So in every age human nature must be dealt with in the 
best way in which it can be reached; and \i there be one 
thing that is shown all the way through the divinely 
inspired record it is the adaptation of methods, institutions, 
and revelations of truth to the weaknesses and necessities 
of men in each particular age. The garment was made to 
fit the figure. The manner of teaching was in accordance 
with the need of the time and nation in which it took 
place. Not perfection, but right direction, was the aim. 

Thi7'dly: Inspiration as properly viewed may include a 
whole statement of material truths, good and bad, which 
makeup a complete history, without either criticism, judg- 
ment, determination, or characterization. The sins, the evils, 
the mistakes of good men are not approved because they 
are stated without any application to them of moral dis- 
criminations and condemnations. 

In the early periods of history, in the record, for instance, 
of the patriarchal age, we are confronted with conduct 
which would drive a man from society if it were committed 
to-day. We permit in a child things which, if he were 
to continue them until he became grown, would deprive 
him of good standing and throw him out of society. And 
in the infancy of the race things were permitted which, 
judged by our modern standards of honor and right, would 
condemn a man as utterly base. They were bad then, and 
they would have been worse in every age since, by reason 
of the growing light that has been brought to bear upon 
truth and duty ; and yet they are narrated in the Word of 
God without a single protest. Conduct was allowed in 
the past which was far less criminal than it would be in 
our age : but it was criminal then ; and nevertheless, there 
it stands, apparently unrebuked. 

Look at Jacob, much of whose conduct would be con- 
demned from beginning to end, according to any modern 
canon of moral criticism. He outwitted, with the con- 
nivance of a cunning mother, his elder brother. He was 



THE INSPIRATION OF THE BIBLE. 19 

politic all the way through. While he was a politician, he 
always thought of himself, and looked out for " Number 
One." He was selfish and cruel. And yet, he is not criti- 
cised ; there is no stamp of dishonor put upon him. He 
acted in these things by the light and the low morality of 
the age in which he lived, making mistakes and committing 
offenses that would be outrageous if they were committed 
in our day ; and yet he stands up as one of the three great 
patriarchs — Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 

Divine inspiration, in the record, then, admits the telling 
of the imperfections of men, of their sins, of their crimes, 
without stopping to lay upon them the law of criticism or 
of condemnation. The duty of placing censure upon these 
things is left to men who apply the moral and spiritual 
principles given in the inspired record. It is not to be 
held that a wrong thing is approved because it is not in 
words disapproved. It is simply to be held that the au- 
thors of the Scriptures stated things as they were, — good, 
bad, and indifferent. 

Fourthly: A true view of inspiration admits of partial 
statements of truth — such as may come within the limit of 
misunderstanding, at any rate. To state to an audience 
a truth larger than the receptivity of that audience is, to all 
intents and purposes, not to state it to them. To explain 
to children in the nursery the operation of the Federal 
Courts as compared with the operation of the State Courts, 
would be to explain to them nothing at all, because they have 
not the elemental "knowledge without which they cannot 
perceive the condition of things, nor cluster together facts 
and make comparisons. You tell them nothing if you tell 
them that which is larger than they can take in. And if 
the inspired record was to be used to any advantage it 
must be adapted to the level and capacity of that age of 
the human mind to which it was originally addressed. It 
is not possible for God, except by working a miracle, 
except by changing natural law, to make known to men 
the great universal truths of their being which ally them 
to the unseen world. Only so much of these truths can be 



20 BIBLE STUDIES. 

put into any record as shall be comprehensible, either by 
the time in which the record is given or by the time 
which shall come after. 

Now, the inspired record states* truths in such partial 
forms that they will be comprehensible to men according 
to the measure of their understanding. Take, for instance, 
the doctrine of immortalit}^ There is not a w^ord in all 
the institutes of Moses — in the five books called " The 
Pentateuch" — which indicates that there is such a thing; 
and yet these are the foundation-books of the Jewisli 
economy. In our time, through the teachings of Jesus, 
that transcendent fact is disclosed; but in the beginning, 
for reasons unquestionably wise, though not made known, 
the inspired records did not develop that side of truth. 
It made known much of God, much of the divine govern- 
ment, much of duty; but of that revelation which lies at 
the very foundation of the New Testament it made no 
mention. And what are you going to do about it, when 
you make a theory of inspiration, except to say that 
inspiration admits of partial, alphabetic, statements, capa- 
ble of coming to more complex and fuller forms in later 
da3^s ? 

Men are shocked when it is said that an inspired record 
may teach by stating things that are not. Well, it can, 
and it does. What are you going to do with the parables 
of Christ? There is not one of them that is not a little 
fiction. They were all artificial; they were invented : 
but they were apt, and among the best of means, especially 
among the Orientals, who teach so much by stories, of 
instructing men in higher truths. Here were falsities, so 
far as facts were concerned, employed for the purpose of 
making verities known. 

The way to bring a child to a true knowledge is to tell 
him things that are not true. If you were to banish all 
the fairy stories, all the fables, all the made-up tales in 
Sunday-school libraries ; if you should take away all of 
what some people call lies — accounts of things that never 
happened, what would become of childhood ? Now, in 



THE TNSPIRAriON OF THE BIBLE. 21 

all times of the development of the human race fiction has 
gone before fact, and has been used as a means of bringing 
men to fact. Although when men have grown to matur- 
ity it is not so necessary that there should be fiction to help 
them to fact, yet, in the adolescence of mankind, in their 
infantile condition, fiction was essential as an instrument 
by which to lift them from a lower to a higher plane. Im- 
aginative elements, instead of tangible actualities, have 
been employed with continual benefit ; and we find them 
employed nowhere more than in the Word of God, both the 
Old Testament and the New. No man need be afraid to 
look upon this thing, and say, "It is so." 

The honored, and most deservedly honored. Dean 
Stanley, who is present in our great city adjoining, said a 
most wise thing in regard to this very subject, when 
he declared that it was not so important to have a theory 
of inspiration as it was to ascertain what are the actual 
facts about the Bible; "for,"' said he, " the theory that 
ultimately is to prevail must be that theory which includes 
in itself all the facts." Therefore, as these things are facts, 
we must take the ground that the inspired record admits 
of statements that are fictitious for the sake of helping the 
imagination and the reason to rise from a lower plane to a 
higher one. Any theory which includes all the facts must 
make room for that fact. 

Fifthly : The fact of a document having been given 
under inspiration in no way limits or mars the freedom of 
the human mind in interpreting the truths taught. In 
other words, we are to interpret inspired language by pre- 
cisely the same laws of interpretation which we apply to 
any other documents. Language which is used by inspi- 
ration is just the same as that which is used without it; 
and the laws of interpretation applied to inspired docu- 
ments are precisely the same as those applied to documents 
of any other kind. Those laws are well ascertained and 
unvarying, and in the main are accepted by every school of 
thought and denomination of religion; and we are not to 
go to the Word of God, to the inspired record, with the 



22 BIBLE STUDIES. 

idea that we must handle hoh^ things in a different way 
from that in which we handle other things. There is no 
sanctity in the inspired record such that the attitude of a 
man's mind should be different in dealing with it from 
what it is in dealing with any other record or truth. We 
are to be guided by the same rules of judgment when we 
go to the Word of God as when we go to any other word. 
And this, not to destroy it, but to save it — to take it out of 
the realm of superstition and out of the twilight of igno- 
rance, and bring it into the daylight of reason and com- 
mon sense. What we want is to rescue the Bible from the 
mists and fogs that have surrounded it, and lay it open 
before the judgment of mankind, and say, "Fearlessly 
inspect it; read it; think about it! " It v;ill stand that, 
and will be all the stronger for it. I am tired of a mystic 
interpretation of the Bible which takes it away from mat- 
ter-of-fact people by wrenching it out of its true relations, 
and substitutes clouds that have no rain in them for sub- 
stantial realities. I am in favor of seeing the Word of 
God handled in the way that any other documents would 
naturally be handled, by well ascertained laws of reason 
applied to interpretation. 

It is not meant, then, that, in teaching the inspired 
AVord, we should say to man's reason, '' Stand aside, and 
hear what God says." The apostle commanded men to 
search the Scriptures, and see if things were not as he 
declared them to be. The whole Word itself is a challenge 
to the reason. Yea, God himself appears, in the light of a 
drama or representation, saying, " Let us reason together." 
Throughout the Old Testament and the New, men are 
invited to reason, reason^ reason! 

SixtJily : On all subjects of mental experience or inves- 
tigation we must accept an interpretation according to the 
best light, analogical, which we have in regard to the thing 
stated; and when we come to read the Word of God care- 
fully the things that are beyond the reach of human inves- 
tigation are very few. Those that are so are stated in 
such a manner that we cannot apply to them analogical 



THE INS FIR A TION OF THE BIBLE. 23 

experimental laws. They are given so vaguely, with so 
few facts, that men cannot fathom them. 

As to immortality, for instance, Paul presents an exam- 
ple of the growth of the seed. The seed dies in order that 
a better thing may come out of it. The Scripture tells us 
that the state beyond is one of transcendent glory; but 
what that glory is, John says, does not appear. 

So, when we speak of the revelation of truths that lie 
beyond the reach of human investigation, beyond ordinary 
experience, beyond scientific reasoning, we can give only a 
very faint interpretation of them, and we take them 
unquestioningly. I take the fact of continued existence 
without questioning. The fact of the resurrection — not of 
the material body but of the spiritual bod}^ — I also take 
without questioning. The statement that personal iden- 
tity and recognition shall be given to us in the other life I 
cannot reason upon; I can only accept it as a simple fact: 
but the purpose of other forms of truth that are there, and 
which lie within the reach of human investigation, we must 
ascertain by studying the facts by which they are illus- 
trated. You w411 admit this in respect to lower forms of 
truth, though you are not accustomed to admit it with 
regard to higher forms. 

When the Bible speaks of things that you cannot learn 
anything about by turning from passage to passage of 
Scripture, seek information concerning it elsewhere. If it 
speaks of silver you may turn to Matthew, or Revelation, 
or Isaiah, or any other of the books of the Old and New 
Testaments, and you will not gain as much light in regard 
to it as you will by taking a piece of silver ore, or a bar of 
bullion, or a dollar piece, and looking at that. You go to 
silver when you want to know what the Bible means in 
speaking of "silver." AVhen it speaks of snow, or trees, or 
clouds, or rivers, or lions, or anything within the reach of 
your knowledge, you go to that thing to find out what is 
meant. You interpret most of what is in the Bible by 
things that are outside of it. When the Word of God 
mentions material things, you do not consider it any viola- 



24 BIBLE STUDIES. 

tion of that word to go outside of it to ascertain what it 
means. 

The same thing is true in respect to persons. We know 
what father and mather are, not because the Bible teaches 
us what they are, but because of our relations to them and 
our intercourse with them. It teaches us what their duties 
are; but what they themselves are we learn outside of the 
Bible. We carry our outside knowledge as a light with 
which to interpret that inside Scripture which refers to 
them. We do the same with regard to kings, to princes, 
to laboring men, to seamen, to men in all relations and 
situations. 

We take the things of which the Bible speaks, and carry 
the knowledge we gain of them back and employ that as 
a means of interpreting the Bible. This is normal and 
legitimate, — nay, necessary. 

The same is true of mental operations. When the attri- 
butes of the mind are spoken of in the Bible we ascertain 
what those attributes are, not by going to the Bible itself, 
but by observing their manifestations in human life. 
What justice, love, and goodness are, of which so much is 
said in the inspired record, we learn outside of that record 
— not inside of it. This Book is paper and ink; it is not 
love. It does not love when it says "Love." No love 
flames from the text when love is spoken of. But go 
home, after a long absence, to your mother, and see what 
love is. Meet your sweetheart after a prolonged separa- 
tion, and see what love is. Go to life for life-facts. Take 
the things that are actual for the interpretation of real 
truths. Life is a better interpreter of the Bible than old 
commentaries are, although old commentaries are not 
unuseful. 

Seventhly : Inspired writings may contain statements 
which in an after-age would require no inspiration. That 
is also true of revelation. It may be needful that things 
be revealed to men by the direct telling of God in one age 
which at a later period would need no such direct telling. 
One says, "You pretend that these are revelations; when 



THE IXSPiRATIOX OF THE BIBLE. 25 

there is not a schoolboy in our day that could not find them 
out, without having them revealed to him." Very likely; 
but in an eaily and undeveloped age a thing may be re- 
quired to be made known through special methods which 
at a later period would not be required to be thus made 
known. It does not follow, that, because at a later period 
men could help themselves, they could have done it at the 
beginning. We put a bottle to the mouths of babes; but it 
does not follow, because when the child is forty years old 
he does not suck the bottle, that he did not need to suck it 
when he was a babe. Things are adapted to the wants of 
infantile helplessness wdiich w^ould be absurd at a time of 
later disclosure. 

Men attempt to show that things in the Bible which are 
claimed to have been miracles were not miraculous be- 
cause they lie within the sphere of natural laws; but in the 
early ages natural laws not understood were miracles; for 
miracles in any age are facts that transcend the knowledge 
and skill of the men who live in that age. 

Childhood is taught by certain methods. Ripe age 
supersedes those methods, but it does not despise nor 
reject them. I have left off the clothes which I wore when 
I was three years old; but I do not despise them. I put 
them on three-year-old children, or grandchildren. So it 
is in respect to the Word of God. It was given for differ- 
ent periods; and it stands to reason that this fact can be 
no objection to the divine record. On the contrary, it is 
eminently conducive to our faith in the efficiency of 
inspired things. 

Hence, we find the New Testament boldly saying what 
some modern preachers would not dare to say. Hear 
Paul declare: 

" Now we are delivered from the Law, that being dead wherein we were 
held." 

If I were to come here and say, " The Old Testament law 
is dead and gone; I don't care for that any more," how 
w^ould a paragraph flame out in the morning newspapers, 
and be heralded all over the country, " Beecher don't care 



26 BIBLE STUDIES. 

for the Old Testament; he says it is dead!" Well, Paul 
says it; and people, without opening their eyes in astonish- 
ment, swallow it, as if it were all right enough. But Paul 
taught that, in the adaptation of means to ends, after a 
fact had served its purpose it ceased to be necessary. He 
took the ground that things which were essential in the 
childhood of the race could be dispensed with when it 
came to manhood. But only if replaced by something 
better ; for, after declaring that the Law was dead, and 
that men were not held by it any more, he went on to say: 

" That we should serve in newness of spirit, i^ad not in the oldness of the 
letter." 

He denied the authority of Mosaism as applied to men 
who live by the spirit of Christ, although indispensable to 
earlier periods. And he was right. An egg-shell is very 
necessary before the chicken is hatched; but would it not 
be very absurd to insist that the chicken should always 
wear the shell? The earlier statements, the earlier institu- 
tions, and the earlier methods of the Bible, when they had 
accomplished their appropriate work, were superseded by 
other provisions, and that without implying any contempt 
of these old instrumentalities. They were adapted to the 
object which they were meant to serve — namely, the de- 
velopment of human life as it originally existed. 

We give medicine to men because they are sick; and if 
this medicine is rightly adapted it gives health, and thus 
renders itself unnecessary, so that it may thereafter prop- 
erly be ignored. The Bible is full of medicine, as it were, 
that has served its purpose — the record of statements, 
institutions, and customs that related to the primitive con- 
ditions of mankind; and any correct theory of inspiration 
must make room for this fact. 

And, finally: The unity of the Bible is not like the unity 
of a inodern work. The Bible is simply a library-shelf filled 
with books. If the writings constituting the Bible, by 
different authors, were bound up separately, as modern 
books are, they would make forty or fifty volumes, written 
in different languages, under different institutions, and for 



THE INS FIR A TIOiV OF THE BIBLE. " 17 

different purposes, by men that had no sort of connection 
with each other; and yet, when brought together, though 
they may not be arranged with accuracy so far as order of 
time is concerned, as a series they have a certain spiritual 
unity, and that is all the unity there is about them. Exter- 
nal unity in the books of the Bible is utterly wanting; but 
interiorly they are one. That is, they all bear on the gen- 
eral questions of man's sinfulness, his duty, his righteous- 
ness, his relations to God and eternity; they are uniform 
in that regard; while in their outward characteristics they 
are very different one from another. 

I think one of the most interesting things in England is 
the Winchester Cathedral. It represents every order of 
Gothic architecture, from the old Saxon down to the latest 
developments in this direction, running through four or 
five distinct periods. In one part of the building you see 
represented the most ancient, in another more modern, in 
another still more modern, and in another, the most mod- 
ern Gothic architecture. The whole constitutes a mag- 
nificent pile. It represents several different schools, with 
hundreds of years between them; but the peculiarities of 
these different schools are brought together so that, al- 
though the individual elements in them are unlike, they 
compose a unit which is admirable, and serves the purposes 
of the church, at the same time that it is beautiful to the 
eye. 

In old Warwick Castle, before it was destroyed by fire 
outwardly, you saw the most irregular and strange group- 
ing. One century built one side, with its tower, of a 
particular kind of wall. Another century built another 
side, with its palatial residence and magnificent halls. By 
accretion, with the growth of architecture, it came into its 
more recent condition. Now, outwardly, it represented 
very different epochs and very different architectural ideas, 
strangely grouped together; but inwardly it was a place 
fit for a noble to live in. All its parts were brought into 
domestic uses, and it answered the purposes of a refined 
and cultured household. 



28 BIBLE STUDIES. 

The Word of God is filled with books which, though 
written in different ages, have an interior unity. They are 
united in telling man how he shall, be in harmony with 
God; how he shall live above his animal life, so as to be 
immortal; how he shall learn the secret of happiness in 
years to come; how he shall be forgiven for sin and avoid 
it. There is but one voice in these books in regard to the 
history of men; they are in perfect accord in this respect; 
whereas, in respect to the instrument, the literary imple- 
ment, by which the great truths of the gospel are conveyed 
to men, the exterior elements of the Bible are exceedingly 
diverse. 

From this general statement it will appear that the 
setting aside of any book that is bound up in the Bible 
will not invalidate ^he others. We know very well that 
Luther did not believe the Epistle of James was a canon- 
ical book, and that he set it aside. We know very well 
that there are modern critics who suppose parts of 
" Isaiah " were not written by the author of that book, 
and should not be ascribed to him. We know very well 
that some of the earlier historical books are supposed by 
critics to be invalidated because they seem to show traces 
of being compilations of still earlier documents, and as 
they say could not have been written by Moses or any 
single writer. 

As for myself, I say that if even it should be proved that 
some of the books of the Bible are not authentic, and 
must be rejected — as I do not believe it will, and that 
others though in the main correct contain more or less 
errors which must be eliminated, it would not destroy the 
Bible, any more than to take a rotten joist from an imper- 
fect place in a house would destroy the house. In taking 
out from the Bible whatever is false, you simply take out 
something that does not belong i:here. Therefore, to criti- 
cise a single book does not alter the whole canon. The 
Bible remains. 

If men go to the Old Testament, then, and undertake to 
give to all that is there an interpretation under the im- 



THE INSriRA TION OF THE BIBLE. 29 

pression that every word and sentence has been forged in 
the soul of God, and put into his Word by his own direct 
influence, instead of its being a demonstrative system 
adapting the amount and the method of truth employed 
to the nature of the minds to be operated upon through 
the instrumentality of other minds inspired and aroused to 
wisdom by the Holy Spirit, making use of natural objects, 
society, all available means, for teaching and developing 
the human race, — then one of two things must happen : 
either the Bible must give way or they must give way. 

This Book is elastic ; and if you put a cast-iron frame 
about it, if you cramp it by theories and philosophies, it 
cannot stand — it w^ill die of suffocation. If you are going 
to save the Bible, you must proceed on the Bible ground: 
take facts as they are, and act according to those facts. 
If men will go to the Word of God simply for the purpose 
of knowledge, to profit withal, and not to find material for 
controversy, not in a spirit of criticism, not even for 
literary enjoyment ; if men will go to the Scriptures with 
the wish that they may be thoroughly furnished for every 
good work ; if they will go to the inspired record as they 
would go to any other document in which they were pro- 
foundly interested, to seek for what is right and pure and 
good, and to be built up in holiness — if men will go in that 
way to the Bible, they will find there treasures that are 
not to be found in any other quarter. It is the history 
of the evolution of the highest forms of human nature. 
Along with this history are accounts of wars, revolutions, 
catastrophes. There are records of lives and achievements 
of men of God. The Book is filled with facts and lessons 
that men would not willingly let die. I could not afford to 
let go what it has taught me of the experiences of mankind 
in the patriarchal age. I could not afford to lose those 
grand old figures of the Israelites, more majestic than any 
sphinxes. I could not afford to have destroyed the 
records of their captivit}'', and of their wanderings in the 
desert. I could not afford to give up the knowledge that 
I have gained of the commonwealths that sprang from the 



^ BIBLE STUDIES. 

polity of the great lawgiver of the ages. Greater than he 
has never been upon the earth, as a mere human being. 
I could not afford to lose the magnificent wisdom and 
poetry and spiritual experience of those grand old states- 
men of the Israelitish nation. I cannot afford to dispense 
with one of the records of those wonderful triumphs of 
human nature under God's guidance. The world has been 
marching through a wilderness amidst conflicts and 
victories, and the records of these victories and conflicts 
are infixed as jewels in the Word of God. They stand 
there to brighten our lives on our pilgrimage, to encourage 
our faith and hope, to cheer us in our childhood, to help 
us in our manhood, and to comfort us in old age. 

I love the Word of God ; and the more I free it in my 
mind and use from superstition, from narrow ecclesiasti- 
cism, and bring it into the atmosphere into which it was born 
and in which it has lived, — the more I make it the man of 
my counsel, the guide to my path and the lamp to my feet, 
—the sweeter it is to me. The more I give to its interpre- 
tation the largeness, the variet}^, and the liberty which in 
every other direction we have learned to employ, the more 
profoundly am I affected by the inspiration of God's Word. 



II. 
HOW TO READ THE BIBLE. 



"Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and alight unto my path." — Psa. cxix 
105- 

This Psalm is, in the original, a literary curiosity, after 
a manner that was apparently delightful to the Oriental 
mind — the formation being something like acrostics in 
our times, every letter of the alphabet having its section. 
But while the outward form is somewhat peculiar, the 
inward form is still more striking. It clusters together, 
from every point of view, the expressions of the sweet 
psalmist, whoever he was, as to the Word of God, both in 
the written Scriptures and in unwritten nature. 

The language is unmistakable, not once nor twice, but 
many times, in which, while speaking of the precepts of 
God's Word as written in his time, he also speaks of the 
law of the Lord as it is made manifest in nature. It con- 
forms, therefore, to our idea of the two Revelations — the 
Word and the World. 

You will observe that the point of emphasis in the pas- 
sage I have read is the guiding power of the Bible ; and if at 
the time this was uttered, when comparatively a small por- 
tion of the Scriptures had been written, that portion of it 
which we are now almost inclined to reject, certainly 
largely to neglect, was so much esteemed by this ancient 
writer, how much more would he have rejoiced if he had 
seen the fullness of the revelation of God as he is made 
known in Christ Jesus, and in the New Testament writ- 
ings of the disciples of Christ ! 



Sunday morning, October 20, 1878. Lesson : Psa. cxix. 97-144. 



33 BIBLE STUDIES. 

More especially for the advantage of the young, I wish to 
speak to-night on the subject of Reading the Bible. There 
are many difficulties connected with this in our time. 
There have been so many questions raised concerning it 
from the outside, the authenticity of the books of the Bible 
has been so much disputed, there have been suggested so 
many scientific objections to it, the reality of the things in 
it has been so much contradicted, that there has come to 
be a kind of haze or mist in the view" of many cautious, 
critical minds around about the Word of God. They are 
not prepared to say that there is not something in it, that 
it has no authority, that it is without influence ; but they 
say that the claims which have been made for it cannot be 
sustained, and that we cannot believe as our fathers did. 
It seems as though there had been a kind of drifting away 
from the Bible on the part of people who fifty or even 
twenty-five years ago w^ould never have thought of reces- 
sion. 

Then, if one undertakes to read the Bible he is like a 
country lad going into a strange city w^here a foreign lan- 
guage is spoken. He has not been brought up to the 
habit of reading it intelligently. It is in fact a library 
rather than a book. It comprises the sacred Scriptures 
of the Israelitish people. It represents their then whole 
literature, and substantially their entire philosophy and 
legislation and law ; and parts of that which is now col- 
lected into one volume are separated in their origins by 
hundreds and thousands of years. 

If we were to gather together the events of Cicero's life, 
and of the life of Sallust, and then, coming down through 
the medieval ages, should stop once in a hundred years 
and pick up the facts of that period, and so on to our own 
day, and if we were to combine these all in a single volume, 
it would have as much claim to logical unity as the writings 
of the Hebrew Scriptures have, that were brought together 
simply by mechanical means. 

The Bible was not all given at once. It gradually un- 
folded through many centuries, representing different ages. 



HOW TO READ THE BIBLE. 33 

different civilizations, different languages ; and now we 
have the results brought together and bound up in one 
book. When a man reads this collection without any 
knowledge of it historically or structurally, and without 
any foregoing familiarity with its contents, I do not wonder 
that he stumbles. 

It befell me, once, to go to a neighboring manufacturing- 
town, and to reach it at about nine o'clock in the evening; 
and for the first and only time in my life I undertook to 
find a friend's house in a strange city at night. I could 
not tell whether the street upon which I entered was going 
out of town or into town ; I could not tell whether if I 
turned to the right or to the left I was going toward the 
center or away from the center of the place; I was helpless; 
and it was only by rousing the people in a house that I 
was able, at last, to find my way and reach my destination. 

Now, going into the Word of God is very much like 
one's going into a town of whose streets and lanes he 
knows nothing. A man is taught that he should read the 
Scriptures. Let him, for instance, sit down and read in 
Solomon's Song, in order to ascertain whether he was a 
good man or not. What sort of a time would he find 
there? Suppose he went into the book of Chronicles, and 
fell upon one of those long genealogical lists, or upon the 
account of David's woes ? He has heard that this book is 
a guide to his feet and a lamp to his path, but, stumbling 
upon such passages, it would not be strange if he found no 
meat in them, A man who did not know where to go, in 
search of curiosities, objects of fine art, or what not, in 
this great city, might wander up and down its streets aim- 
lessly and uselessly. There is a great advantage in know- 
ing where to apply for what one wishes to find. And in 
reading the Bible, it is important to know how to read and 
what to read — for this book is not, as I have already said, 
an essay or philosophical treatise, whose various parts, be- 
ing united, make a perfect whole, but is a cluster of books 
brought together through long periods of time, having 
different immediate objects, and subserving different local 
3 



34 BIBLE STUDIES. 

ends. The only unity is one of general spirit, making for 
righteousness of life. 

Then there is another difficulty .(and it is not a small 
one) — namely, the enormous amount of rubbish that has 
been gathered around about the Scriptures. You know 
how it is with the cities of the East that are now being- 
exhumed. In Egypt they are digging down to old cities 
under centuries of accumulations of sand. In Assyria they 
are doing the same. Jerusalem itself lies forty feet below 
the level of the present city; if you would walk the streets 
where the prophets walked you must go down through 
rubbish to get where they were. But no statue, or pyra- 
mid, or sphinx, or treasure sought was ever covered down 
with learning and other accumulations as the Word of God 
is. If you doubt it, read the commentators. Take a little 
of Adam Clarke, and Matthew Henry, and other writers 
on the Bible. There is a great number of these commen- 
taries (less than a thousand volumes); and it is almost in- 
credible how about every element — as it were, on every 
letter — of the Book, in regard to whatever is connected 
with it, in one way or another, there is a special plea. 

To a very large extent, moreover, these commentaries 
have proceeded on a radically false principle. You will 
perceive how hard it is for a man to get the right point of 
view in reading the Bible. I hold that the theory of the 
literal inspiration of Scripture is a theory of the devil, and 
that it will lead a man who is logical and consistent as 
straight into infidelity as possible. The theory that every 
word and every letter of the Bible is inspired of God — in 
other words, that by an irresistible impulse God put cer- 
tain thoughts in men's minds and hearts, without any 
volition on their part, so that they were impelled to say 
exactly what they did say — is the absolute destruction of 
any belief in inspiration. Under this theory a single error, 
certainly a series of errors — of a material, exterior, or physi- 
cal kind — the showing that dates are false and statements 
incorrect, the discovery that inconsistencies exist, that one 
part is not in exact agreement with another part — these 



HO IV TO READ THE BIBLE. 35 

things utterly ruin the faith of the believer in literal and 
verbal inspiration, and so, his faith in any inspiration. 

It is true that the Bible is an inspired book — but in a 
much higher sense than that which is thus claimed for it, 
and vi^hich is pragmatical, pharisaic, and minifying. I have 
already dealt with this, but for the young there may be a 
further consideration of some points. The grander and 
truer theory of inspiration is that under God's providence 
all the moral sentiments and noble tendencies of mankind 
have been growing in the direction of divine truth; that 
there has been a guidance, a general enlightenment, of the 
human race, in every age, especially among certain peoples; 
that men have developed great moral principles, and some 
to a large degree have grown into heavenly knowledge; 
that the counsel and secret thoughts of God were thus 
indicated by human growth in grace; that exceptional 
persons were raised up in every period who could see what 
was thus made known, and who made a faithful record of 
what had transpired under this inspiration of God; and 
that statements were made by them of the experiences 
of the inspired race, so far as they were unfolding out of 
nothing into something, from lower to higher forms of 
knowledge. This theory of the inspiration of Scripture is 
quite reconcilable with the fact that there are mistakes of 
letters and words and even of historic statements in it here 
and there, without lessening its spiritual value. 

Now, if it was necessary, for the development of the 
truth, that holy men should be inspired of God, they were 
nevertheless vien^ and you must take their utterances as 
infallible only for the purpose of moral and spiritual 
instruction, making allowance for the imperfect operation 
of their minds by reason of the limitations to which they 
were subject as men. In other words, if God employs 
instruments he must employ them with all their defects 
and liabilities; and as he did use men, he used them with 
all their defects and liabilities. Therefore, that in the 
Bible there are literal mistakes, verbal mistakes, literary 
mistakes, and statistical mistakes, is not strange at all. 



36 ~ BIBLE STUDIES. 

These do not detract from its authenticity as a genuine 
document, or its authority as a spiritual guide. 

For example, in showing on the chart where the Ged- 
ney's Channel runs through to New York, suppose the 
channel should be put down exactly right, but that in 
giving the depth of some outside place or in representing 
some other minor detail — the name of the maker of the 
chart, or what not — there should be a mistake; so long as 
experience proved that there was no error in the location 
and width and dept' of the channel, and no error that 
rendered vessels in passing through it liable to danger or 
inconvenience, would you denounce that chart as unau- 
thentic ? The fact that there was in it a minor mistake 
here and there which did not interfere with its practical 
use would make no difference with its real value, and you 
would not think of finding serious fault wdth it. 

If we insist, as many people do, that the writings of the 
Old and New Testaments came directly from the mind of 
God, then the slightest variation from accuracy in any 
statement of fact would be fatal, because we should say, 
"God cannot lie "; and yet there are many errors of this 
sort in the Scriptures. If it be claimed that the penmen of 
the Gospels were absolutely infallible, we have a test case. 
All the four Evangelists state that there was written in 
three languages over the cross of Christ the declaration, 
" This is Jesus, King of the Jews." Here was an instance in 
which there was the actual writing of a legend or inscrip- 
tion; and, according to the theory of verbal inspiration, 
four witnesses that saw it, and wrote it down, were kept 
absolutely from making a mistake, so that the four writ- 
ings would be just the same ; and yet, every single one of 
them differs from all the others in recording it. Matthew 
has it one way, Luke another, Mark another, and John 
another. There is not, however, any such variation as 
invalidates the fact that is stated. The general statement 
is the same, but the way of copying or remembering the 
inscription differs in the several cases. They do not all 
have it the same, letter for letter and word for word, but 



HO IF TO READ THE BJBLE. 37 

they have the substance alike, and their minor variations 
of memory evidence their common honesty and trustwor- 
thiness. 

So of matters concerning dates and numbers. A person 
says, "I ate strawberries at your house last June." In 
fact, it was in July; but what is the difference, so far as 
the validity of the occurrence is concerned? 

And there may be in the Bible errors of time, certain 
dates may be wrong, numbers may be incorrect, and they 
may seem all the more erroneous because the use of 
numerical terms differed in antiquity from their use at 
the present time. The frequent employment of familiar 
incidents was often accompanied by exaggerations. For 
instance, /(?;'(>' was used as we now use a hundred. We say, 
"I have been there a hundred times," simply meaning a 
great many times. You recollect that the flood prevailed 
forty days, that the prophet fasted forty days, that Christ 
fasted /<?;'/y days, that Moses wa.^ forty years old before he 
went into the wilderness, that he was forty years in the 
wilderness, and forty years more in the desert. Forty 
means, here, a great many, instead of a definite number; 
and the same is true of many other figures in the Bible. 

I am instancing the theory of verbal inspiration to show 
that those writers and commentators on the Word of God 
who follow this theory have undertaken to reconcile con- 
tradictory passages by spiritualizing them, by wrenching 
them out of their literal meaning, and giving them a 
metaphorical signification, or vice versa; so that w^hen a 
man comes to read the Bible according to their notions he 
feels that he has come to Babel, and that there is confu- 
sion worse confounded. If he is a clear thinker, and a 
straightforward philosophical man, the result will be that 
if he really believes the commentators he will lose all con- 
fidence in the authenticity of the Scriptures. I do not 
wonder that multitudes of men turn away from the Bible 
with disgust under such circumstances. 

Right between extreme metaphoricalism and extreme 
materialism stands the Word of God itself, claiming to be 



38 BIBLE STUDIES. 

simply a book from which a man can thoroughly furnish 
himself for right living. It gives enough of God to enable 
you to understand the moral character of the universe. 
It gives enough of human nature to enable a man to per- 
ceive what ails him. It gives directions enough in regard 
to every one of the faculties of the human soul and every 
one of the paths of life to enable a man who wants to walk 
in the way of righteousness to find that way. It gives as 
much information as one needs to make him thoroughly 
honest and upright. Nay, more, there is in it all that is 
necessary to enlighten a man's understanding and fill him 
with faith and hope and love. No man can go amiss in 
regard to any of these things who reads the Bible wisely 
and diligently. 

Notions have been formed from the Old Testament 
that good men (as, for instance, David) committed great 
offenses; that treachery was allowed; that cruelty was 
permitted here and there ; that God winked at these 
things. I do not undertake to discuss that subject nOw, 
although I shall do it later ; but whatever may be said 
about the divine moral government in the primitive ages 
of the world, the question is for every man's own self, 
whether there is not, if he really desires to learn how to 
live right, material in the Word of God to enable him to 
do it. There certainly is. For a man who undertakes in 
earnest to ascertain what to do with his thoughts and feel- 
ings and conduct as regards his fellow men or himself 
individually, in the household, in civic affairs, and in busi- 
ness or economic matters, there is no book in the wide 
world which contains so much and such varied information 
as the Bible. You can spin and weave it into anything 
you like; from it have been formed medleys of every 
description; but when one says, "How shall I be a better 
man ? " he finds that question answered better in the Word 
of God than anywhere else : when you come to the ground 
of its ethics there is no dispute. It may be difficult for you 
to know what Ezekiel meant — I do not suppose he himself 
knew ; it maybe difficult for you to understand what John 



HO IV TO READ THE BIBLE. 39 

saw in the Revelation; you may have a very imperfect 
notion of Daniel's beasts, and of a great many other mys- 
tical and prophetic things; there may be applications and 
parallelisms of history which you cannot reconcile; in 
regard to all these things there is ground for difference of 
opinion: but on the subject of essential vianhood \\\^r^ is no 
difference of opinion. Men are at substantial agreement 
respecting it. The Roman Catholic Church and the Prot- 
estant Church see eye to eye so far as such matters are 
concerned. The sects may differ about philosophies and 
theologies, but not about honesty, purity, truth, hope, love 
and joy in the Holy Ghost. Men may differ in regard to 
doctrines and forms and ceremonies, but not in regard to 
hardness of heart, obstinacy, and all other elements that 
come into play in our daily life. About these, men are at 
agreement in all churches. So much of the Bible as it was 
meant that we should live by — is perfectly plain. 

If you v/ant to know whether or not pride is beneficial, 
there are no two voices in the Bible about that. If you 
take the testimonies of Scripture for centuries and thou- 
sands of years you will find that they have always been the 
same concerning the affections. In the patriarchal age, in 
the time of Christ, and all the way down to the present, 
you will find the same teaching on the subject of selfish- 
ness. In the earliest day, and from that time down, you 
will find the same witness borne as to what prayer is. In 
regard to meekness, the Psalms are just as explicit as the 
Sermon on the Mount. Indeed, the Sermon on the Mount 
was largely drawn from the Psalms. Respecting the expe- 
riences of men in sin, and under fear and remorse, the 
statements are precisely the same in the Old Testament as 
in the writings of the Apostles. Here is a book whose 
instructions, though written at widely different periods, 
agree in every essential particular. Here is a book, por- 
tions of which were written hundreds of years after other 
portions, the later authors having sometimes no knowledge 
of the writings of those who preceded them, and yet there 
is identity of faith and experience. They are all precisely 



40 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the same in regard to the great issues of life and character, 
and the ways in which man can attain reconciliation with 
God and hope of immortality. With an evident develop- 
ment from lower to higher completeness, the similarity of 
kinship and spirit from beginning to end is uniform and 
constant. 

Therefore, under that system of moral inspiration which 
God has been carrying on in all nations and in every age 
of the world, — under that process of unfolding in which 
men rise through social refinements and affections to a 
larger development of human life, — under that divine 
scheme, the race have everywhere and in all ages come to 
the same results. They have found the law of human life. 
Just as a man finds the law of electricity or light, so men, 
through thousands of years, have found what are the quali- 
ties of character which fit them for time and eternity; and 
the united testimony of mankind on that subject is both 
comprehensive and simple, and is absolutely without any 
objection whatsoever from critics or infidels. 

If men come, then, to the reading of the Word of God 
through commentators, there is a use in that of which I 
will speak by and by; but if an ordinary man, like any one 
of you, should say to me, ''Mr. Beecher, I want to live a 
better life," my advice to him would be, " Steer clear of 
commentators; read t\\^ Bible — not what folks have written 
about the Bible." "Well, how shall I read?" "There are 
a hundred ways; but the way above every other way is to 
read for the purpose of learning how to be a right-minded 
man and how to live right." 

As regards the structural errors, the literary mistakes, 
the arithmetical inconsistencies, that are found in the 
Bible, they neither invalidate the general drift of the 
history recorded in it, nor change the evident tenor of its 
instructions. If one is really studying the text of Scrip- 
ture, its formation and its nature, if one is going into a 
philosophical analysis of the structure of the Word of God, 
as a teacher in a Sabbath school or a preacher of the 
gospel, commentaries, judiciously selected, may be of great 



noil' TO READ THE BIBLE. 4I 

use to him now and then; but as a general thing they are 
not essential. And though there may be some advantages 
in being able to read the text in the original Hebrew or 
Greek, this is not so important as may be supposed. The 
number of instances in which the meaning is not suffi- 
ciently brought out in our translation are comparatively 
speaking but few. Here and there minor errors may 
exist, — the sense may be obscured, rectifications of state- 
ment may be desirable, passages may be transposed and 
taken out of their proper connection, — errors of printers, 
of translators, of copyists, of editors, and, for what we 
know, of authors; but the marrow^ of this book is not 
touched by any of these discrepancies. Commentaries 
may be useful for teachers, and by and by may have a 
sparing use for ordinary readers of the Word of God; but 
as a general rule the book itself is its best commentator. 

If you ask me, " How shall I read the Bible?" I say, in 
the first place, you may read it for philosophical knowl- 
edge, for knowledge of antiquity, for local historical knowl- 
edge; you may read it for the sake of the literary pleasure 
to be derived from its study; you may read it on account 
of its poetry and its magnificent prophecies; but you must 
not understand, by this, that you are to read the Bible for 
those things alone. You must not suppose, for instance, 
that all the prophets were " prophesying " in the sense of 
foretelling., and valuable on that account. Jeremiah, Isaiah, 
and Ezekiel were reforming statesmen; and, although here 
and there foretellings were mixed up with their discourses, 
the greater part of their prophesying W2i?, preac/mig ; their 
exhortations applied to human affairs, and were replete 
with the most sublime symbolism. Nothing in other 
literature can approach in grandeur the utterances of the 
prophets. They are equal to the Psalms of David in this 
respect. There is no high feeling, there is no low feeling, 
there is no feeling of joy or sorrow, of exhilaration or 
despondency, that has not its voice in the Psalms. Every 
passion that inflames the soul has its lyrical expression 
there. Nowhere else are portrayed doubts, fears, thanks- 



42 BIBLE STUDIES. 

givings, confidences, as they are set forth in the Psalms of 
David. A man is fortunate who knows how to describe 
his own emotions in the language of David — only, our 
emotions are so small that we are. like David in Saul's 
armor when we undertake to walk in the language of the 
Psalms. 

The dramas of the Old Testament prophets are extremely 
beautiful. The book of Job is a magnificent drama, as 
truly as Shakespeare's plays; but it is not a historical docu- 
ment. The story of Ruth is unsurpassed for beauty. The 
history of Joseph and portions of other Bible histories 
have no superiors in literature. To those who know how 
to wisely cull from the contents of the Old Testament it is 
a magnificent reading-book. There is nothing that chil- 
dren listen to with more interest than portions of the 
Scriptures; and there is nothing to which persons in old 
age cling with more tenacity than some of its passages. 
It was not, like many of our modern books, artificially 
gotten up for purposes of making money. It is a book of 
simplicity, in which are recorded the experiences of men 
who did the best they knew how to do. It is, to a great 
extent, a statement of what were living facts. It therefore 
possesses the elements, not only of simplicity but of uni- 
versality, power, truth, and beauty. 

You can read the Bible also for controversy; but that is 
venomous reading. It may be necessary to gather together, 
for the illustration of a common truth, different passages 
wrritten in times of w^arfare, or during periods of revolu- 
tions of thought such as those which occurred in the lives 
of Luther, and Wesle}^, and other reformers, when great 
changes were wrought; it may become essential to collect 
various representations of truth, draw them up in battle 
array, and with them bear down on opposing views and 
teachings; but such a use of this book seems to me to be 
infelicitous. It certainly is uncongenial to me. 

I have spent nearly forty years in the ministry, and dur- 
ing the early part of that period my work was more or less 
controversial. I was born not far from the time of the 



HOW TO READ THE BIBLE. 43 

split between the Old and the New School Presbyterians. 
I was brought up in the gladiation of a theological semi- 
nary. You may think I do not know much about theology. 
You do not know how much I know about it, for I have 
tried to forget all that, and to recover from the scars and 
wounds inflicted by a controversial reading of the Bible. 

If I had preserved the love-letters of my mother written 
before she was married to my father, as I have fragments 
of a few of them, and I should make them parts of a con- 
troversy on the subject of the affections of mankind, and I 
should fight those affections up hill and down, one with 
this passage and another with that, until there was not a 
line in the letters that was not associated with some intel- 
lectual battle, how utterly would they be emptied of their 
beauty and sweetness ! How, after I had made wads of 
them to fire at views different from those which I chanced 
to hold on the subject under discussion, should I divest 
them of those features which gave them greatest value 
and attractiveness ! 

Now, the Bible is filled with the tracks of warriors. The 
prophets have been drawn up, like athletes, and led here 
and there by one set of controversialists to oppose another 
set. The whole New Testament has been marshaled, 
with regimentals on, to put down the Unitarians, the Uni- 
versalists, the Arminians, and the Arians. The tocsin has 
been sounded in this great book, and all parts of it have 
been summoned to battle array. Every man in the con- 
flict has been armed with a text as a sword, and the Word 
of God has been made to do service as a magazine of 
artillery. The good news called " the gospel " — the glad 
tidings that God so loved the world that he gave his Son 
to die for it; the invitation of Christ, "Come unto me, all 
ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you 
rest," — these things theologians have hardly listened to, 
although the whole creation has groaned and travailed in 
pain until now. Notwithstanding the New Testament 
teems with expressions of the deepest feelings of sympathy 
and compassion for human infirmity, these, its profound- 



44 BIBLE STUDIES. 

est elements, have been for a large part unheeded by so- 
called religious teachers. Instead of using the Bible as a 
means of help to men in the great exigencies of life, they 
have made a wanton, wasteful use of it, for purposes of 
controversy. They go into the Word of God in a spirit 
utterly at variance with the spirit in which it was written. 

But suppose a man, in the right spirit, desires to read 
the Bible for purposes of guidance and direction, then how 
should he read it? Well, that simplifies the matter. In the 
first place, you want to read the Bible with reference to 
your own state. You want to know how to carry yourself 
in the world. A good book to read with that object in 
view is the Proverbs of Solomon. I wish every man who 
does business in New York would read those proverbs. 
Some parts of that book can be read with great profit by 
every one. In it are laid down precepts for secular con- 
duct. On the subjects of virtue and vice, of giving way to 
unwarrantable appetites, of right and wrong methods of 
administering property, of hard-heartedness toward one's 
neighbor, of extortion or usury, of hospitality, of truth- 
speaking, of being puffed up with pride, — on these and a 
thousand other important subjects which relate to right 
living, you will find wise criticisms, witty epigrams, whole- 
some counsels, in this book of Proverbs. 

Then, when you have read that book for the right order- 
ing of your life, take a pencil and mark the passages in it 
whose injunctions you are willing to follow. Make a little 
cross on the margin opposite those passages that you have 
made up your mind to adopt as your rule of practice ; 
and put an interrogation point over those passages that 
you think are so hard that you cannot promise to live up 
to them just yet. 

This is business. If I were to deal with you in a com- 
mercial way, I should say, '' Be so kind as to mark the 
things which you have to sell with the prices at which 
you are willing to sell them, that I may not be laboring 
under any misapprehension." So in counseling you in 
regard to reading the Bible — and particularly in advising 



now TO READ THE BIBLE. 45 

you as to your use of the Proverbs — I am impelled to make 
a similar request. 

Take this book, and mark the things you have no hesi- 
tation in following, and those you fear you cannot follow. 
Study especially those passages that you think have a per- 
sonal bearing upon you — upon your nature or disposition, 
upon your duties to your neighbors, upon your relation to 
business. You may find, when you come to honestly square 
your life with the rules laid down in the Proverbs, that you 
w^ill be obliged to break this or that partnership, that it will 
necessitate your changing your companions, or that it 
will otherwise completely revolutionize your life. This I 
call rubbing the Bible in. So employed, it is a lamp to your 
feet and a light to your path. I instance the book of Prov- 
erbs alone ; but you know as well as I do how this same 
method may be followed throughout this great Library of 
Life — and especially in the books of the New Testament. 

Now, then, let those who will, ridicule Moses and make 
fun of the prophets as much as they have a mind to. 
You will have business enough to carry your life by those 
parts of the Bible that commend themselves to your 
judgment as being true and wise. It is a book that 
exposes, in their glaring deformity, your meanness, your 
pride, your vanity, your lust, your inordinate appetites; 
and if you are going to follow its directions you will need 
God to help you. Nothing is truer than that if we wish 
to escape from the lower instincts of animalism and 
organize our life on inspirations of higher spiritual wisdom 
nothing but God can enable us to succeed. 

Therefore, let me close the lessons of to-night by urging 
that while you are reading this book you let go up to the 
throne of grace a silent prayer that the Spirit that origi- 
nally sent it forth may give you the inspiration which was 
given to those through whom it came, and make you hon- 
est in obeying its injunctions. If you lied to other 
people as much as you lie to yourselves, there would not 
be a man on earth that would believe you. If you deceived 
other people as you deceive yourselves, you would be given 



46 BIBLE STUDIES. 

over to utter unbelief in the eyes of your fellow men. 
Therefore ask God to deliver you from lying and self- 
deception. Ask him to give you light not only to read the 
Bible aright but to discern what it> reveals. Ask him to 
take away all those hindrances that prevent your being just 
as true, pure, and honest, as this text requires you to be. 

I am not asking you, to-night, young men outside of the 
pale of religion, to come into the church ; I am not asking 
you to accept the doctrines of Christianity : I am asking 
you with honesty and sincerity to read the Word of God ; 
to take it with an earnest desire to ascertain whether or 
not it is what it claims to be — a light to show you how to 
w^alk ; a book that is able to thoroughly furnish you for 
every good work in this life. I simply invite you to make 
this experiment. Is it an unreasonable request ? Is it not 
wise for you to read with the purpose of knowing what 
you are, what you were designed to be, and how you may 
work out your true destiny ? You are brought into 
circumstances that make you feel that you are not living 
aright, and are not ready to die ; and is not this a simple, 
rational way in which to endeavor to arrive at correct 
conclusions on so important a subject? 

I beseech of you, receive, in the spirit in which I have 
spoken these things, my advice in this matter. Read, as I 
have asked you to, this book, which has guided so many 
thousands out of darkness into light ; this book on which 
your father leaned for support ; this book from which 
your mother drew consolation. Do not throw it disdain- 
fully aside. Do not despise the foundation on which holy 
men in every age have stood and worked. 



III. 
THE BOOK OF BEGINNINGS. 



"And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them 
in all the Scriptures the things concerning himself." — Luke xxiv. 27. 



This was spoken of our Master after his resurrection. 
You see here, with a little modification of the language, 
how the Old Testament books, or the religious books of 
the Israelites, were named at the time of our Saviour. 
The}^ were called " The Law of Moses," " The Prophets," 
and " The Scriptures," or " The Writings." This was the 
threefold definition, in which were included all the books 
of the canon now called " The Old Testament." Where 
it is translated, '' Beginning at Moses and all the prophets, 
he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things 
concerning himself," it is really the equivalent of saying 
that he interpreted Moses, the Prophets, and the other 
Scriptures in respect to himself — these three. 

The Old Testament, for a variety of reasons, has passed 
out of use for many men and women who call themselves 
Christians. They think that it is an imperfect guide as 
respects modern times, though relatively perfect as re- 
spected ancient times ; that it was superseded by the more 
full disclosure of spiritual truths by the Saviour, and by 
the Apostles under inspiration, and that w^e do not need 
to go back to it as at school children go back to their 
hornbook ; that men learn certain necessary lessons, so 
that, having learned them, and their schoolbooks, as it 
were, being superseded by other and better ones, they 
have no longer use for them. This is all the more so be- 



Sunday evening, November 10, 1878. Lesson : Psa. 



48 BIBLE STUDIES. 

cause there are so many parts of the Old Testament that 
have inherent difficulties in them ; because there are so 
many things recorded which men are supposed to be 
obliged to believe, but which strain "belief to the uttermost ; 
because there are such wondrous miracles, such remark- 
able phenomena, such associated historical statements, so 
many things that, according to modern and ordinary in- 
terpretation, seem exaggerated if not absolutely erroneous. 
Rather than take such statements and difficulties implicitly 
they find it easier to put aside the whole book ; and because 
it is hard to get gold out of the rock they throw the rock 
and the gold all away in a heap, and let them alone. 

Now, it is true that the Old Testament stands on a differ- 
ent ground in relation to us from the New ; but it does 
not follow from this fact that there is not in it present and 
future medicine for Christian men ; and it is my desire, in 
the discourses which I give on this subject, not so much to 
criticise for the purpose of tearing to pieces, as to present 
the Old Testament even in its more questionable parts in 
such a way that they can be received and used with per- 
sonal profit by men of our time. Luther said of it, " It is 
the most useful and beautiful of books." There is eminent 
beauty in it to those that know how to find it ; and it is far 
from being without usefulness, although it be a record of 
the first things that are known to us. 

Having discussed the question of inspiration and re- 
jected the theory of a limited and verbal inspiration of 
these writings, — accepting, rather, the theory of the inspi- 
ration of the human race by its holy men that are compe- 
tent to receive divine impressions, — and holding the Word 
of God to be a record of the best thoughts and feelings 
which have existed in every age over which the record 
passes, I propose to apply that theory in some detail to 
the successive books of the Old Testament; and if it shall 
seem to any of you that, in the course of this, I set aside 
unnecessarily a good deal, or depart too widely from old- 
fashioned notions, I call your attention to the fact that 
everybody, without exception, in the whole Christian 



THE BOOK OF BEGINNINGS. 49 

world, has set aside whole books of the Old Testament — 
and not individuals alone, but the churches themselves. 
For where, in the world, is there any man who ever teaches 
that Leviticus is binding on us ? The whole instituted 
religion of the Israelites has been set aside ; the altar is 
gone, the tabernacle is gone, the temple is gone, the priest 
is gone, and the forms of worship are gone. We leave 
them utterly. If, therefore, to any it should seem auda- 
cious to teach a change in reference to the books either 
before or after the ritualistic books of the Jews, comfort 
yourselves, quiet your disturbances. If I do it at all, I do 
that which the whole church has done. 

In the Old Testament the five books of Moses are called 
"The Law," "The Law of Moses," and "The Book of the 
Law of the Lord." The Rabbis called it "The Five-fifths 
of the Law." In more modern times it is called '' The Penta- 
teuch " — pentateuch being a Greek word which signifies y??7^ 
books. It is made up of Genesis, Leviticus, Exodus, Num- 
bers, and Deuteronomy. In Hebrew the Israelitish books are 
named mainly from Some w^ord or sentence in the first verse. 
Our names differ from those employed in the Hebrew 
scrolls. Genesis signifies beginning or beginnings ; it is a 
book that contains a history of the beginnings of things in 
the world. Exodus signifies going forth, or emergence j it is 
the history of the deliverance of the Israelites from bond- 
age, and their traversing the desert. Leviticus is so named 
because it is the book that treats of all the forms and ceremo- 
nies of the priesthood, and of their worship, that worship 
being conducted by the Levites — the sons of Levi. Numbers 
is a general history, and it is called Numbers simply because 
it records, takes the census of, Israel. Deuteronomy is, liter- 
ally speaking, the Second Laii\ — a recapitulation, a second 
law-giving or enunciation of the Law. 

If Washington's farewell letter had included the whole 
history of the colonies in brief, and the theory of the Con- 
stitution, with the general features and the policy of the 
free commonwealth, that would have been exactly a parallel 
of Deuteronomy, which is in the form of a farewell letter of 
4 



50 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Moses to the people, and contains a recital of their history, 
and the laws and ordinances imposed upon them by God 
through Moses. 

To-night I propose to consider only a portion of the book 
of Genesis. It is not my object to go into it in minutiae 
and detail, but to give a general view of it. 

This book may be said to be divided into two parts. 
The first twelve chapters contain the history of that vast 
space anteceding the appearance of Abram ; and the rest 
is an account of the patriarchs, Abram, Isaac, and Jacob, of 
their wanderings, and of their posterity down to the period 
of their inclusion in the Egyptian kingdom. 

My purpose, then, this evening, is to take simply the first 
division of Genesis, including the first twelve chapters, 
leaving out connecting and minor elements. 

This history may be said to be an account, first, of Crea- 
tion ; second, of the Garden of Eden ; third, of the Flood ; 
and fourth, of the Towner of Babel ; or an account of the 
creation of the Terraqueous Globe, of Man in his primifive 
Condition, of the Corruption of Men, of their Destruction 
by the Flood, of the Dispersion of Men, and of the Origin 
of Languages. 

Before entering upon that, let me say a word on the sub- 
ject of authorship. These books have universally been 
attributed to Moses. In modern times very severe debates 
have occurred on this subject. I do not consider it a sub- 
ject of very great importance so far as practical utility is 
concerned whether he wrote them or not. The mere 
name of the author of a book is not half so important as 
the nature of its contents. The result in my mind is about 
this, that these books were very largel}'' produced by Moses 
or under his direction: either compiled — as the first twelve 
chapters ; or, as the subsequent chapters, formed from 
legends, traditional histories, or other material, giving the 
same sequences, accounts of the patriarchs down to his 
own time, and then adding his own personal history, and 
the history of the different tribes and of their wanderings 
until they came to the Promised Land. 



THE BOOK OF BEGINNINGS. 51 

I have no doubt that the substantial basis of the books 
was from the hand of Moses, or that they were written by 
some clerk or Levite under his direction. But that there 
were not corrections and re-editings of them by other 
hands is not so plain. These may have been made at a 
comparatively late period, during the reign of the kings, 
and not far from the Babylonian intrusion. 

If this seems to be tampering with the inspired author- 
ity, we are to consider that the rights of a book and an 
author were different in a primitive age from what they 
are in a later age, when, by development, authorship has 
become a business, and passed out of a crude and^rude 
state into a regulated state, with methods and rules. 
When, in an early period, books were made on sheets of 
lead or on prepared skins; when but one book existed in 
a nation; when it was a thing unknown to the common 
people, except as they occasionally heard it read; when it 
was a phenomenon standing unique and apart from every 
other mode of intercourse — then there were no estab- 
lished rules or laws. In the medieval age, certain men, 
thinking they would honor and glorify God if they added 
to sacred Scripture some theories of their own, not doubt- 
ing that they weie true, committed what are called "pious 
frauds," that in our day would be not only exceptionable 
but manifestly improper. For a man in this age of the 
world to tamper with history, for instance, to inject into 
the writings of Froude or Gibbon statements and com- 
ments as if from the pens of Froude or Gibbon, would be a 
high offense at the court of public sentiment; it would be 
an outrage: but in the early time, when there was no trade 
of book-making, when there was no author's profession, a 
man jotted down what he knew of his people, and subse- 
quently some man who came after him added what he 
deemed to be the further ascertained facts concerning that 
people, and nobody thought it to be criminal. In the sim- 
plicity of an infantile age men set down what was before 
them; and it was an operation without guile, for there was 
then no way of putting together for preservation addi- 



52 BIBLE STUDIES. 

tional facts, except by incorporating them in the single 
record with facts already set down. And in later days 
critical acumen may be able to point out, in ancient and 
modern documents, where the line "runs between the gen- 
uine and the spurious, or the earlier and the later. 

The question of the authorship of Moses is very much 
to historical and literary criticism, but is very little to 
common readers. It makes comparatively little difference 
to me whether Moses, or a Levite or some scribe in the 
reign of the kings, wrote what are called " The Books of 
Moses." Here are these historical books handed down to 
us, and our reception of them is to depend upon their 
interior contents, rather than upon their authorship. 

Let us consider, now, the accounts in Genesis — the 
Creation, Adam and Eve, the Tower of Babel, the Disper- 
sion of Men, and the Change of Language. In regard to 
all these, they are to be neither accepted nor rejected as 
scientific or historical statements made in our day would 
be. You are to bring to bear upon them the same rules of 
criticism that you apply to any ancient document. 

Here comes in the principle enunciated last Sunday 
night, that the inspired records are relative to the want of 
the age in which they were made, and that a record which 
was suitable to the condition of the understanding of an 
early period would not be suitable to the condition of the 
understanding of a later period. If any man holds the 
theory that God, in the beginning, sat down and wrote 
things which he wanted to be true of the children that he 
created on the earth, and that those things were to be 
equally true at the beginning, the middle, and the end of 
existence; in other words, if any man has the idea that the 
inspired records are a continuous narrative, an uninter- 
rupted overflow of divine thought given to men, and that 
they in some way proceeded from God, as Mill's philosophy 
proceeded from Mill, as Cowper's poetry proceeded from 
Cowper, or as Milton's works proceeded from Milton — 
then he must take everything as its stands in the Word of 
God without modification. But there can be no fact more 



THE BOOK OF BEGJXKIXGS. 53 

indisputable than that the Bible is not a continuous narra- 
tiv^e, nor an uninterrupted overflow of divine thought to 
men. 

The Old Testament is made up of a score or more of 
books, between which whole centuries roll. They are 
composed of histories of different nations in different 
stages of development, adapted to the conditions of men 
in given times and circumstances, and their uses were re- 
lated to those times and circumstances. Therefore, a truth 
that may be brought out in a large measure in a later day 
in an earlier and far distant age might have been brought 
out simply as a twilight truth. There is noonday revela- 
tion in the New Testament; in the Old Testament is early 
morning revelation. Those early statements of the begin- 
nings of things in the world were designed, primarily, for 
the times in which they were written and to which they 
came. They were adapted to unripe and childlike condi- 
tions of the human race. They presented the thoughts 
that were in them in forms that were useful at that time, 
even if they should cease to be useful in later days. We 
are to interpret them by the light of the later inspiration 
of the human race, and not to undertake to interpret the 
later inspirations of the human race by being tied up to 
these earlier ones. A scientifically ascertained fact in a 
later day is not to be set aside for the sake of ''saving the 
Scripture," as men foolishly say. The testimony of God 
in the whole history of the human race is more important 
than to maintain a special form of teaching or truth that 
existed in the early primitive times. 

Take, then, the history of Creation. It is declared, 
apparently, on the face of Scripture, that God in six days 
created the earth, and all the things that it contained. 
The very first debate originated in the now unquestionable 
fact that creation was not a peremptory and instantaneous 
thing. Over against the old interpretation of Genesis, 
there rises the divine record of the rocks. Geology in our 
times says that between one period and another of this 
earth ages rolled — that one thing was not created on 



54 BIBLE STL' DIES. 

Monday, the next on Tuesday, the next on Wednesday, the 
next on Thursday, the next on Friday, and the next on 
Saturday. Evidence to the contrary has accumulated in 
so vivid and compulsory a manner that at last a theory has 
been settled upon that the ''days" meant in Genesis were 
periods, and much illustrative matter is brought to bear 
upon it. 

I am not especially interested in that debate. I am 
satisfied that by " days " ages were meant. All is picto- 
rial, and adapted to that idea. But I have no doubt that 
those who first received the books supposed that ordinary 
days were referred to. I question whether they could have 
understood periods of time such as we now begin to un- 
derstand in this connection. So it is held, b}^ the intel- 
ligent teachers now in orthodox churches, that the creation 
of the world was a work, not of literal days of twenty-four 
hours each, but of periods which may have been thousands 
of years long. 

As a part of this, was the idea that Creation, as deline- 
ated in the book of Genesis, was, when it took place, 
instantaneous, and by the voice of command ; that God 
spoke, and it was done. It is recorded, " God said. Let 
there be light, and there was light." It is also recorded, 
" God said, Let the earth bring forth ; " but is it to be 
supposed that instantly he saw things creeping and grow- 
ing and forming ? The disclosures of the globe are dis- 
proving this conception of instantaneity in creation, and 
showing that the method by which things were created 
was, as it still is, one of gradual unfolding. In every 
department new links are being added to the chain until 
the evidence is becoming irrefragable that the mode of 
making the world has been by succession, one thing 
growing out of another. 

Now, science, rightly so called — not in its tentative 
suggestions, not in its first shrewd guesses, but in its 
ascertained facts and modes — is the voice of God, just as 
much as the divine decrees on Mount Sinai were the voice 
of God. A fact is a voice of God. It shows what his 



TIIK BOOK OF BEGINNINGS. 55 

thought has been, it illustrates what he has executed, and 
there is no going behind it. To deny it is perilous. If it 
be different from what the record has been supposed to be, 
if the ascertained facts of creation are not such as they 
have hitherto been understood to be, we must accept the 
later record, the growing revelation : for there is an inspi- 
ration that begins things, presents them partially ; there is 
a later inspiration that gives them a larger development, 
so that they are seen in a more clarified state ; and there 
are final inspirations that bring them out in full complete- 
ness. 

The process by which, in the progressive painting of a 
fine oil portrait, are brought out, first the rude outline, then 
the crude filling in, and then the perfecting of every part, is 
the same process as that by which, under God's inspiration, 
the primitive races were developed from their primitive 
condition, step by step, to higher states, until in these 
later days we have larger understanding, more compre- 
hensive knowledge, and may hope to be nearing the final 
or full form of things. The inspiration of the race is not 
by fits and starts ; it is by gradual development. It began 
with the beginning of man, and holds on with him, and 
will continue clear down to the remotest period. We have 
not come to the end of inspiration y^X.. 

Study it as you may, in the light of God's riper reve- 
lation, the Old Testament history of crration gave to an- 
tiquity characteristics of the sublimest nature. There is 
nothing low or mean about it. Even as measured by tran- 
scendent modern refinement, it is grand in the extreme, 
and is worthy of a place — the ver}^ highest place — in any 
literature. It is a revelation that life and the world sprang 
from the forces of the divine will, and not from chance ; 
that the world has not come from mere ether, finding its 
way anonymously, but that it is the result of power, grad- 
ual, prolonged, dift"erentiated, under the divine method — 
that it is a creation of God. That fact stands effulgent, 
in the record. 

Moreover it is monotheistic. In the cosmogony of other 



56 BIBLE Sl'CDJES. 

nations, the creation and government of the earth were 
ascribed to multitudes of little gods ; in Genesis they are 
represented as the result of unitary divine thought, so that 
there is harmony throughout the whole universe. 

Now, if you take the narrative in this larger way it 
is very extraordinary. How came it ? It was prepared 
at the time of Moses. It is acknowledged to be a primi- 
tive document, or a compilation of primitive documents, 
wrought into the form of a book, by the hand of whoever 
was the early scribe or author of that part of Genesis. 
How happened it that away back in the beginnings of the 
world such a grand conception of the highest result of 
the creative power of God was given to primitive men ? 

Look at the details as they have been since disclosed to 
mankind. The order of creation is substantially ascer- 
tained. Much is now supposed to be understood by men 
of science as to how it took place. Not that there is 
exact knowledge on the subject ; but there is such marked 
identity betw^een the recorded order of procedure and the 
result of actual scientific research as to make it impossible 
that this should have been accidental. Here is the oldest 
document concerning the proceedings of things far back 
of any recorded history ; and when the inspired AVord is 
compared with the record of God in the rock, in the soil, 
in the whole structure of the globe, it is found to be in the 
main correct. 

Such an account as could be developed in its details at 
this age of the world would have been absolutely useless 
to an early period, just as a treatise on optics would be of 
no use to children in the nursery ; so if all that is included 
in geology, geography, botany, ethnology, and biology 
had been put into the account of Genesis in the early 
period, there would have been no one on earth competent 
to understand it. It would have been like eloquence to a 
babe in the cradle, or philosophical knowledge to a child. 

The next notable passage in the book of Genesis is the 
account of the Garden of Eden, in which it is said our first 
parents, Adam and Eve, were placed. This has been held 



THE BOOK OE BEGlXKlXGS. S7 

to be a literal statement of fact. I do not so take it. I 
side with that large number of devout Christian men and 
scholars who think this to be an allegor}'-, containing a 
profound spiritual meaning ; who think that the man is the 
fact — not the story in which the meaning of the fact is 
conveyed. Our Lord and Saviour, when he undertook to 
impart the highest truths, followed the universal custom of 
his race and time, and invented parables, inclosing these 
truths in them. The New Testament is full of parables ; 
and the Old Testament is all alive and glowing with Ori- 
ental poetic imagery. 

But the church has given this statement of the Garden 
of Eden a literal rendering. It is supposed that Adam 
and Eve were created perfect. I shall not stop to refute 
this belief. It is supposed that the fate of their whole 
posterity was made to depend upon their conduct ; thac 
when they fell, all that should come after them fell with 
them ; that on account of their guilt the whole human 
family have been laid under a curse, and that you and I 
and everybody are to be condemned because Adam ate an 
apple the eating of which was forbidden. That may do in 
a theological seminar}^, but not in the minds of sensible 
men. We are responsible for what we do ourselves, but 
not for what our ancestors did. Am I responsible for all 
the iron that my grandfather forged out on the anvil, 
though I had nothing to do with it? Am I responsible for 
all that my Welsh ancestors did centuries ago I am 
responsible for my own conduct, for what I myself do ; but 
I am not responsible for that which took place before I 
was born. And to say that the whole human race are 
morally responsible for Adam's act in eatmg an apple 
contrary to the divine command, and are therefore guilty 
of "original sin," is absurd. I will admit actual trans- 
gression on the part of Adam, but I will not admit "origi- 
nal sin" on our part. Theologians hold that every man 
has had sin "imputed" to him on account of the sin of 
his great ancestor — Adam. To such devices men are 
obliged to resort in maintaining erroneous doctrines ! 



cS BIBLE STUDIES. 

But whatever may be set aside, this remains: That man 
was not created an immutable and untemptable being, 
fixed as a crystal. A dove holds fast to the creative idea: 
it is a perfect dove from the begii'ining to the end. An 
eagle begins an eagle and is always an eagle. Everything 
runs after its nature unerringly, without mistake, except 
man. He is a fallible being. He has it in his power to 
make his condition, and to avoid evil; but he is temptable 
and mutable. He is placed in circumstances such that he 
has larger sovereignty, with plenary power to determine 
his own lines of action. He is organized on a higher 
range than the mere animal. This statement is the fact in 
the allegory; and it is a fact transcendent. Adam, who is 
represented as being temptable, liable to sin, and yet as 
having power to choose between good and evil, stands for 
the human race, as the prototype, the allegorical man, the 
first parent. He has a numerous posterity; for there is 
not a man in life that is not, as Adam w^as represented, — 
mutable, liable to go astray, ready for deterioration. Adam, 
as an allegory, stands to represent what is the nature of 
man as distinguished from the brute in creation. Spirit- 
ually, he stands related to posterity in all the ages and 
everywhere. The statements of primitive histor}^, of the 
beginnings of things, point undoubtedly to the condition 
and destiny of mankind. 

I have no doubt, then, that this record of Eden is a record 
of facts ; but I do not at all believe that it is a record of 
facts in such a sense as many men suppose it to be. 

Now as to the story of Noah and the great Flood. It is 
known that the earth is round, that the world is divided 
into continents, that there are Africa, Asia, Europe, and 
North and South America, and that there are the Atlantic 
and Pacific oceans, the frigid oceans and the vast Indian 
ocean ; but there was a time when men supposed that the 
world was flat, and that they saw the whole of it in a two- 
days' journey, in the provinces east of the Mediterranean, 
the Black, and the Caspian seas, and that it was there sub- 
merged. 



THE BOOK OF BEGINNINGS. 59 

Doubtless there was anciently a great deluge; I have no 
doubt that there was a time when, as far as men could see, 
the earth was covered with water; unquestionably there 
was something which answered to the preservation of 
animals in an ark; but to suppose that the whole terra- 
queous globe w^as deluged, that all living i.iings except 
those which were preserved in the ark w^ere drowned, and 
that every insect, every bug, every worm, every mosquito, 
every butterfly, and every animal, were gathered together 
in pairs, and placed in the ark, and kept there during the 
flood — to suppose that all these creatures, of wdiich there 
are thousands and thousands of species, w^ere so gathered 
together, is too much for me. I can swallow a good deal, 
but I cannot swallow the sum total of all the organized 
animals on the globe! How^ many animals did Noah 
gather together in pairs and put in his ark ? All the m.ore 
common ones he might have carried through the Flood, 
but not the animal kingdom as we understand it. That 
would have been impossible. As a testimony to the cor- 
ruptions of men, as a witness to the great natural law by 
which God cuts off the wicked, this account is important, 
and has great force. We are to interpret the story of 
the Flood as they interpreted it to whom it was given, — 
as a lesson of the judgment of God; but not by taking the 
whole of modern knowledge, and carrying it back to 
antiquity, and undertaking to make that ancient statement 
include all that has subsequently been evolved by instruc- 
tion and research into the multitudinous myriads of the 
animal kingdom. This is the record of a fact ; but not of 
the fact theologically ascribed to it in modern days. 

Next in order comes the history of the Tower of Babel, 
as an explanation of the different languages of the globe, 
I have no doubt that, at the time, this was the very best 
account of that history which could be made. I have no 
doubt that it is a faithful representation of the under- 
standing in that age of the fact of the differing languages 
of the races of men. I have no doubt that there was some 
answering fact in the history of the people — namely, that 



6o BIBLE STUDIES. 

there was a scattering of tlie builders of that tower, and 
that to this was attached the impression that they went 
forth speaking, from that hour and moment, different lan- 
guages, as a lesson against heav«en-defying ambition. 
Yet even such a fact would in our day find a more natural 
rendering, — namely, that when men were divided and 
scattered abroad, out of that circumstance sprang a variety 
of new conditions, associations, and wants which led — as 
they always do lead — to the necessity of differences of 
language. 

Looking back over the ground we have trodden, I 
remark, first, by way of application. How little is the 
knowledge that is given in the record of the Old Testa- 
ment ! Of the immense periods of time from the history 
of the first man on earth down to the account of Abram, it 
would seem as though the thing spoken of occurred 
within the space of a few scores or, at most, hundreds of 
years; but between the beginning of the human race on 
earth and the time of Abram must have elapsed thousands 
and thousands and thousands of years. 

Yet I have given you the substance of the whole history 
of that period which is recorded. Thousands of years 
past, — the most momentous years that have been gone 
through by the human race, — and not a line nor a word ! 
Thousands and thousands of men, in thousands and thou- 
sands of years, unfolded without a record ! How infantile 
was the race as represented by the record when w^e first 
begin to get some thought and knowledge of them! And 
their condition at that point in their history when the 
record first speaks of them, as they were beginning to 
emerge toward manhood — how low, how uncivilized, how 
crude, how nearly animal it was! What knowledge had 
the human race then of the world on which they dwelt? 
None. Did they understand the law of the sun or of the 
planetary bodies? Not at all. Did they have any concep- 
tion of the laws generally which govern physical things? 
Far from it. There was no revelation, no inspiration, 
which taught them these things. Was there anybody or 



THE BOOK OF BEG/XXLVGS. 6 1 

anything which said to them, ''This is the globe on which 
God has appointed your destiny; these are the laws by 
which, observing them, you are to maintain life ? " No. Not 
a syllable was there disclosed to the primitive human race 
on these subjects. What did man know of men ? What 
is there in the record which speaks of man's own personal 
self and the knowledge of it ? There is no evidence that 
man ever knew that he was a thinking being or that there 
was a beginning of thought in him. No man knew that 
there was a heart with such force that it carried Hfe 
through his whole body. No man was aware that he had 
a liver in which the devil resided. No man understood 
the structure of his being, outward or inward. In respect 
to his creation, his development, and his destiny there 
was no instruction given. What knowledge of ethics, ot 
right and wrong, was given to him ? None. There is no 
trace in the Old Testament record of the setting up oi 
any ethical system that met the wants of men in society 
Indeed, there was no society. Men were wanderers in the 
desert. They were a pastoral people. They were sav- 
ages. Life was slowly evolved. Those ideas which lead 
to the performance of duties had not yet been impressed 
upon the mind. The whole system by which men are to 
regulate their conduct tow^ard each other was not pro- 
claimed even in its beginnings until you come far down in 
the Old Testament record. 

What provision was made for true w^orship in all the 
period before Abram's time, yes, and throughout all the 
patriarchal period ? Polytheistic systems had grown up 
among the Phoenicians, Assyrians, Babylonians, and Egyp- 
tians ; but, as I shall show next Sunday night, there was 
among all the early Hebrews not a church nor a tabernacle 
known, and there was no order of priests. There was now 
and then an altar ; on special occasions, intermitting at rare 
epochs, there were prayers ; but the whole series of He- 
brew religious services were of comparatively modern date. 
The attempts to carry back the church to that early period 
and to prove its existence by records in the primitive 



62 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Scriptures, involves such violent stretchings of fact and 
application as ought to make an honest man blush with 
shame. I do not think there is any conscious deceit ; but 
to undertake to harmonize the ancient inspired records 
with modern religious developments leads to an amount 
of unconscious dishonest quibbling that would cause a 
man who indulged in them to be turned out of a law-court. 
Even where the judges themselves were partial in his 
favor, I do not think, according to the procedure of human 
affairs, that such improbabilities as have been brought 
forward by interpreters of the Word of God in regard to 
views and doctrines would be tolerated. 

How restricted, when we look at it, do we find the 
knowledge and the nature of God's moral government to 
have been ! There was no divine teaching on these 
subjects, so far as the inspired record is concerned, until 
long after the time of Abram. There are hints of crude 
worship by Abel and Cain, and recognition of God by 
Enoch and Noah. But there was no literature of Jehovah. 
There was vague knowledge of God and creation, but 
almost nothing else was taught to men until a vastly later 
period. Putting his hand through the great dark ante- 
cedent period, and gathering out of it all the elements 
that were known of God and religion and morality, Moses 
brought together the early teachings ; but what were 
they ? The Stories of Creation, the Garden of Eden, the 
Flood, and the Tower of Babel. These were all there was, 
and they covered no man knows how many thousands of 
years of the existence of the human race. Yet there are 
men who attempt to take the advanced knowledge of 
these later days and carry it back to primitive facts, and 
give to them the same interpretation that they give to 
facts that are transpiring among us to-day. It is a mon- 
strous misuse of the Old Testament. It is the very way to 
kill the Scriptures dead — if they could be killed. When 
this history of the primitive condition of the world was 
first dawning into twilight, men saw men as trees walking. 
The wind they were accustomed to think of as the breath 



THE B O OK OF BE G/A'A 'E\ 'CS. 63 

of God. When the lightning flashed they thought it was 
his eye flashing over the earth. When they heard the 
thunder they thought it was his voice, and they said, 
'' God is speaking." In their infancy men looked at all the 
facts about them with uninstructed eye and undeveloped 
philosophy, and the best that they got out of them is put 
down in the sacred writings, and is precious and valuable. 
Here is the history of the beginnings of the human race. 
You have a chance to measure the difference between man 
at the beginning of time and man in our day. 

Is it not a striking fact that not only at that ancient 
period but away down to the time of Christ, immortality 
was not known to the Jews ? There is not a trace of it, not 
a word concerning it, in the five books of Moses. It is not 
wrought into precept or statement ; it is not made a 
sanction or an authority ; it is not mentioned in any way ; 
it is utterly unknown in the early Scriptures ; and even in 
the later prophets the allusions to it are dubious. 

Take this history, then, as a twilight inspiration of the 
nascent race, as a record of their progress, as a disclosure 
of their development, of the simplicity and beauty of their 
lives, and it has a moral power as well as great beauty and 
transcendent excellence. Let it stand to show what men's 
ideas were at the beginning of their history. Let the his- 
torical documents of the Bible, the simple statements of 
the Old Testament, not be damaged by being interpreted 
according to the laws of modern science. Let them re- 
main as instructive allegories, or as the best account that 
could be given in those early days, of phenomena which 
men could not understand. 

I read the accounts in this old Book with ever-grow- 
ing pleasure. I read them with more profit than I did in 
childhood, when I held, in common with the uninstructed 
church, that they were exact inspirations and revelations. 
I now walk in those dim aisles of antiquity, and hear the 
lisping syllables of primitive man, and behold the way of 
God toward him, and draw lessons as to how we are to 
deal with the savage and the wants of men from seeing 



64 BIBLE STUDIES. 

how God dealt with nascent man, — for the bottom of 
society represents the beginnings of the world. There is 
degradation in the communities in which we dwell; nay, 
the primitive animal instincts of man are in our very 
selves; and we have need of the wisdom that comes from 
the inspection of the divine method as God infuses himself 
into institutions and policies and manhood itself, by adapt- 
ing his truth to the conditions and wants of mankind. 

Remember Him who spake as never man spake, saying 
to his disciples, " I have many things to tell you, but ye are 
not able to bear them now." Christ adapted his instruction 
to his disciples, even so late as that period when he was on 
the earth, according to the measure of their understand- 
ings, and not according to the largeness and fullness of 
the truth as he understood it ; and how much more may 
we presume that the same thing would have been done by 
God's providence when the human race was but as a babe 
in its cradle, unknowing and incapable of knowledge ! 

And if, according to the measure of their knowledge, 
the race in times gone by w^ere responsible not only for 
conduct but for character ; if the law of cause and effect 
was just as powerful in the moral kingdom from the 
beginning as the law of cause and effect is in the physical 
kingdom ; if they, in accordance with the small light they 
had, were under condemnation for disobedience, — as all 
these ancient histories show that they were, — how much 
more responsible are we, how much more shall we be 
amenable to the law of cause and effect, and how much 
more shall we be under condemnation — we, upon whom 
has come the knowledge that has been gathered through 
successive ages, that has accumulated, and that has rolled 
down upon us, if we do not therewith lay the foundations 
of purified life, and furnish the motives of a nobler man- 
hood ! 



IV. 
ABRAHAM. 



" Looking unto the promise of God, he wavered not through unbelief, 
but waxed strong through faith, giving glory to God, and being fully 
assured that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. Where- 
fore also it was reckoned unto him for righteousness. — Rom. iv. 20-22. 



It is indispensable, if we take the full comfort of sacred 
Scripture, that we should wholly get rid of that natural 
but very incorrect idea that it is something, in all its nature 
and parts, which is perfect, — ^unless we reckon imperfec- 
tion as an element of perfection, as we must. For if it be 
true that the scheme of creation in the mind of God is to 
evolve from the lowest conditions a race from ignorance, 
little by little, to more knowledge, and from a low estate 
of virtue, step by step, to a higher ; if, in other words, it is 
a part of the divine plan that the beginnings of things 
shall be infantine, then it is indispensable that the econ- 
omy of these beginnings shall have the nature of imper- 
fectness. 

It is therefore entirely in accordance with this whole 
divine plan, and it takes nothing from the sanctity of 
Scripture, to find that in the early periods there is the rec- 
ord of much that bears unmistakably the stamp of imper- 
fection. Otherwise it would not be a truthful or a fitting- 
record. If you represent men as having observed, before 
the era of observation was developed ; if you speak of men 
as naving discriminated between the physical and the 
spiritual, before the time came when human nature was 
able to do this ; if you describe the early simplicity of the 



Sunday evening, November 17, 1878. Lesson : Heb. xi. 1-16. 

5 



66 BIBLE STUDIES. 

pastoral lives of a people according to the conditions of 
men in civilized society, — you carry doubt and unbelief back 
upon these early periods to every man that is philosoph- 
ical, that loves truth and is sensitive to it : but if ancient 
records come down to us bringing memorials of earlier days 
having all the mistakes of imperfection in them, they carry 
their own evidence of being a transcript of those rude, 
unknowing, superstitious times. 

So we may, in some sense, say that imperfectness is one 
of the signs of genuineness. As the history of a child, if 
written, will be a history of prattle, of misunderstanding, of 
obliquity in various ways ; as in order to be a true history 
it must contain an account of these imperfections, so the 
earlier records of a remote people may well be expected to 
bear in themselves these evidences of veracity. 

The Arabian, the Persian, the Jew, the Christian, the 
Mohammedan, all hold in sacred reverence the name of 
Abram. This name is more celebrated than any other in 
universal history. We marvel at this, for Abram was not 
a military hero. He was not a founder of cities. He was 
not the king of an empire. Nor was he, for aught that we 
know, a great thinker, nor a teacher, in any particular sense 
•of the term. No line fell from his pen. No golden sen- 
tence has been preserved from his lips. Unlike Confucius, 
or Zoroaster, or Buddha, or Moses, he founded no system 
either of philosophy, of religious belief, or of worship. He 
was a wandering shepherd, and nothing more than that. 
If you would see his living image, as it exists to-day in real 
life, go to the original, the Bedouin sheik with his turbaned 
head, his cloak, and his long spear. This wild chief of the 
wandering tribes of the East may not be your conception 
of Abram which is founded upon the pictures of modern 
artists, but without doubt it is the very life-form of the 
patriarch. 

The history of this great chief is very simple ; it would 
seem, at first, as though there were but little in it for com- 
ment ; and yet, upon consideration, there is in it more than 
can be encompassed in any discourse — more than the plan 



ABRAHAM. 6y 

of these Bible lectures will permit me to enter upon. I 
must skeletonize it. 

He was called by name, first, Abram — '' Father of Ele- 
vation " or "Great Father"; but in later life Abraham — 
" The Father of Multitudes," owing to the promise which 
was made to him, that his posterity should be as numerous 
as 'the stars in the heavens, or as the sands upon the sea- 
shore. He was " the father " pre-eminent. He was the 
founder of a nation, without being, at, the same time, a 
pretender to anything that he was not. He did not pro- 
fess to be a god, or a demigod. In regard to heroes, the 
founders, the lawgivers of all lands of antiquity, you shall 
find in their history the beginnings enshrouded in the pre- 
tense that they were in intimate communion with God, in 
the same sense in which holy men are in communion with 
him. Not so Abram. He never moved out of the simple 
sphere of the shepherd life. But he is known universally 
as "the father," and is termed familiarly in the literature of 
many nations yet, not "Abram," nor " Father of the Faith- 
ful," nor " Father of Multitudes," only, but " The Father." 
And it is a little remarkable that, reaching down through 
the space of thousands and thousands of years, we find, 
when the new system came in, and the last great Teacher 
appeared, that he taught us to begin the very approach to 
God with the phrase, "Our Father, which art in heaven." 
This is antiquity connected with the later periods of life. 

Abram was the ninth descendant of Shem, son of Noah. 
After the increase of Noah's posterity in Armenia they 
came down from the mountainous country into what is 
called Mesopotamia, the southern part of it — Chaldea. 
Abram is said to have dwelt in Ur with his father and 
brethren. An Ur used to be located at a point where the 
Tigris and Euphrates empty into the gulf ; but there were 
three or four or five places by that name, and the best 
knowledge we have of it is that it was probably the Ur 
lying far to the north of the mouths of the Tigris and the 
Euphrates — that it was in the upper part, near the Arme- 
nian mountains. 



68 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Abram's family were idolaters. Legend says that Terah, 
his father, was a maker of idols. Abram was seventy years 
old when he heard that inward Voice, the call of God, com- 
manding him to leave all his associates and associations, 
and go forth, the great emigrant of antiquity. His first 
move was only a march of a day or two, from Ur to Ha- 
ran, which lies to the west of Ur. For five years he dwelt 
there, where his father died. Then the impulse returned, 
which was to him as a voice of God calling him a second 
time; and he set his face westward. Is it not remarkable 
that since the great incursions from the North to the 
South in Asia and Europe, emigration has been from the 
East toward the West — never from the West toward the 
East, as if men followed the sun — as if they sought to see 
what fields he saw in his constant circuits ? 

Abram passed the Euphrates. The ford probably re- 
mains where this patriarch describes it as being. It is 
probable that his journey took him not far from Damascus, 
and thence southward until he reached the river Jabbok, 
along which his grandson, Jacob, found his path on his 
return from the same region in Padan-Aram. 

What this " call " was that Abram heard, no man can now 
define. The impulse, we cannot doubt, was a high and 
sacred one ; but it was the impulse of an emigrant — not 
that of a conqueror who, with a sense of ambition and 
conscious power, went forth to subdue new territories. 
He went out, with his small band, as an emigrant, with 
the promise that he should have a great posterity. It lay 
in the future. Compare the feelings of this great original 
patriarch in going forth from Mesopotamia with the feel- 
ings with which thousands and tens of thousands have left 
their homes in days since — the Pilgrims that left England, 
and came, over the stormy sea, and landed on the shores of 
New England ; those emigrants that, dropping further 
down, early made their home in Virginia ; those other 
emigrants that streamed out from the Eastern states and 
found the great basin of the Ohio, the plains of the Rocky 
and Sierra Nevada mountains, and California itself; and 



ABRAHAM. 69 

the stream that has never ceased to flow, simply with the 
latent hope of bettering their condition, without half the 
conviction that belonged to Abram — of a call from God, and 
the divine assurance that he should be the founder of a 
great nation in which all the earth should be blessed. 
Nevertheless, these emigrants go on laying foundations, 
suffering hardship, accumulating treasure, and establishing 
institutions, whose full benefit will be known only to their 
children or to their children's children. 

Whether in the dreams of sleep, whether in some appear- 
ance to the senses, or whether under the influence of vivid 
imagination so strong that his subjective state became 
objective — whether in one or other of these ways this call 
of God was made to Abram, we are not now to determine. 
All we know is that we are to suppose not that God spoke 
in an audible voice out of the heavens to him, but only that 
Abram received spiritual impulse, knowledge, and strength, 
which set him upon his journey. He was the father of 
emigrants. 

It is not difficult to trace the route which he pursued, 
because it was the route of the great caravans. There 
were but few routes of travel at that time. The East is not 
even now diversified with highways. Roads are almost 
unknown there ; and those that exist are for the most part 
not for wheels but for the camel and the ass. Roads for 
wagons and chariots in the Or;ent are still unknown in any 
such sense as that in which we have them in this country. 

Entering the country of Canaan not far below the issu- 
ing of the Jordan into the Sea of Galilee, Abram's first 
point of rest was taken under a tree. He spread his 
tent — he who, except in Egypt, never, to the end of his 
life, dwelt under a roof. There, as shepherd, he lived for 
a brief period. Then, that his flocks might have the bene- 
fit of larger pasturage, he moved south to Bethel. After 
that, still going south, he went to Mamre. While there 
famine overtook him, and he descended into Egypt, the 
great granary of the East. How long he dwelt there we 
cannot ascertain accurately. That he remained there until 



70 BIBLE STUDIES. 

he had greatly increased his household, and enlarged his 
possessions of silver and gold and flocks, we are definitely 
informed. Here occurred one of those episodes which are a 
blemish upon his memory — undoubtedly a blemish, but not 
such a blemish as criticism in modern times has made it to 
be. His wife was his sister by his father, but not by the 
mother. It is probable that she was more nearly in the 
relation of what we call a niece than in that which we 
esteem as a sister. At any rate, she seems to have been 
beautiful ; and in going down to Egypt, fearing that the 
king would imprison her in his harem, and that in order to 
possess the wife. he would slay the husband, Abram be- 
sought her to represent that she was his sister and not 
his wife, thus deceiving the king. He was rebuked after- 
wards when on the king's learning the truth she was re- 
stored unharmed to him; and they dwelt peacefully in 
Egypt. 

Years afterwards, Abram returned from thence to Gerar 
in the southern part of Palestine, where Abimelech was 
still king. Strangely enough, to those who read with criti- 
cism, precisely the same story is told of Abram and his 
wife in relation to Abimelech, — as though he twice repre- 
sented that she was his sister and not his wife, and as 
though the second time she was restored to him with a 
rebuke. Is it probable that this thing took place twice ? 
No. It is far more likely that two different documents, 
each giving this account, have been embraced in the Mosaic 
history. 

We find substantiall}^ the same literary error occurring 
in the New Testament. In one of the gospels an account 
is given of a visit of Christ to Nazareth, as though it 
occurred at one period of his life, and in another it is 
declared that he visited it at another and later period of 
his life. The two records are precisely the same. Those 
who advocate the verbal and literal inspiration declare 
that there was no mistake in the reckoning — that he did go 
twice thus to Nazareth. It is said that on Sunday, twice, he 
went into the Synagogue ; that a book was given him both 



ABRAHAM. 71 

times ; that he opened it at the same phice both times, and 
read the same Scripture, and gave the same interpretation ; 
that both times he was set upon and dragged out ; that 
both times there was an attempt to throw him down a 
precipice ; and that both times he escaped out of then- 
hands. Thus men resort to inconsistencies and absurdi- 
ties instead of simply saying that both visits were one, that 
one Evangelist who gave the account was correct, but that 
the other was mistaken as to the date. 

In regard to another occurrence in Christ's ministry 
there is a discrepancy — his driving out from the Temple 
the money changers and those that sold doves and beasts. 
One of the Evangelists puts it at the beginning of his 
ministry, and another at the close. Verbalists, in order to 
save themselves from saying that there was a mistake of 
date in either narrative, say that it occurred twice. They 
tell us that Christ went into the Temple on two occasions 
and said the same thing both times, and drove out the 
same men that sold doves and animals, and the same money 
changers. There is no reason why men should sacrifice 
their common sense, and insist upon putting the Scripture 
to a rack that would ruin it if they could succeed in press- 
ing against it this doctrine of verbal, absolute, literal in- 
spiration. 

The patriarch returned from Gerar to Bethel. It was 
here that the memorable discussion took place between the 
herdsmen of Abram and the herdsmen of Lot. Lot was 
Abram's nephew\ They appear for a time to have dwelt 
together with common possessions ; but in consequence of 
the increase of the amount of property and in the number 
of herdsmen and servants there began to break out jeal- 
ousies and contentions. The nobility of the patriarch is 
made manifest in the settlement of this question. It might 
very well be employed as a type of the proper settlement of 
controversies in later days of the church. He says to Lot, 
" The country is before you. Make your choice. If you 
will go to the south I will go to the north ; or if you will 
go to the north I will go to the south. Let there be no 



72 BIBLE STUDIES. 

contention between us. Take your way and I will let you 
alone, and I will take my vva}^ and be let alone." So Lot 
went down to the interior of the luxuriant plains where 
Sodom and Gomorrah lay ; and he derived the natural con- 
sequences — relaxation and corruption ; while Abram kept 
to the hills, rude, rugged, harsh, in many respects, but giv- 
ing vigor, manhood, simplicity, and virtue. Abram was 
evidently a broad-minded, able manager, for in whatever 
place he sojourned it is recorded that his possessions and 
his household increased. 

Not far from the time of this division, not many 3'ears 
after it, one of those events took place which developed 
the greatness of the patriarch. It seems that there had 
been, from the east and the northeast, an invasion of the 
great king, Chedorlaomer, who had taken possession of all 
the cities of the plain and the country far around, and 
taxed them. He had no right in these places any more 
than England has in India, but he did what England has 
done ; he took with a strong hand and held under tribute 
nations that he had no business with. It is recorded that 
the king gathered his forces and swept the people and 
their possessions away with him, traveling by the line of 
the Jordan clear up toward Damascus. 

Then it was that Abram gathered together the three 
hundred servants born in his own household, with such 
confederates as he could, and, marching day and night, 
surprised the king and his forces, routed them, followed 
them, and scattered them utterly, bringing back the herds 
and the captives, and restoring them to their homes. 

It is m.emorable that on the return he met Melchizedek, 
King of Salem ; and it is ver}^ remarkable that this priestly 
king, so far as can be gathered from the original, was a 
worshiper, not of Abram's Elohim or Jehovah, but of 
another God. He was not in agreement with Abram ; but 
he was truly religious, probably a worshiper of one God, 
and therefore, under whatever name, of Abram's God. 

When this king offered, if Abram would restore the 
captives, to give him the goods, the old chief towered too 



ABRAHAM. 73 

high to accept anything as payment. Said he, '' I will not 
take anything that is thine, lest thou shouldst say, I have 
made Abram rich." So he took nothing, and sent all 
back to their original possessors. 

The remaining events in Abram's history are few, but 
of transcendent importance. It had been promised to him 
that he should be the father of many generations. Yet he 
Vv'as now ninety years old, and no child had been born to 
him. Then comes, not so much the history of Abram, as the 
record of one of the customs of the country and the race. 
By his wife's wish he married, in a secondary way, the 
bondwoman Hagar ; and by her was born a son, Ishmael, 
The history of Hagar and Ishmael, if it has not given rise 
to a great deal of doctrine, has given rise to a great deal 
of art, of romance — for it is a romance ; and the pictorial 
story in the old Scripture compares favorably with the 
efforts of modern art. 

But Sarai, the wife, after she had arrived at an extreme 
old age, gave to her lord and master a direct and legitimate 
heir, in Isaac. Then broke out in Abram's peaceful family 
jealousies and difficulties, such as polygamy alwa3^s entails, 
and always will entail. The result was, as might be 
expected, that the wife was mightier than the husband, 
and she drove forth Hagar and her child, and Abram's 
reputation as master in his own household was at a dis- 
count. In reality, Hagar was a great deal better off in 
the wilderness with her son than she would have been in 
Abram's tent with that woman to despotize over her. To 
go forth into the wilderness in that da}^ was not so hard a 
thing. She went forth from no house, frorh no luxuries, 
simply from a tent. She went forth from nothing to 
nothing; and although history records a temporary suffer- 
ing at first, it also records relief and prosperity almost 
immediately ; for Ishmael became the father of a great 
nation. 

After this occurred one of the most striking events in 
the history of Abraham (for from the birth of his son he 
took the name "Father of Multitudes"). He was moved 



74 BIBLE STUDIES. 

by the voice of God (whatever that voice may have been : 
whether it came to him in a dream, whether it was a 
vision, an impression received by him, or what it was, I do 
not undertake to say) to follow the' example of all the 
nations around about him that on great occasions were 
offering their children to the gods. 

We have a half-instance of this in the later history of 
Jephtha and his daughter. That military chieftain dedi- 
cated to sacrifice the thing that first should meet him 
coming out from his house on his return from battle, if he 
should have victory. Under memorable circumstances 
parents were accustomed to dedicate their firstborn to the 
gods, and the dedications consisted in sacrifice. 

Such was the impulse that was brought to bear upon 
Abraham. He had received the promise that he should be 
the father of many generations ; but the fuUfiUment of 
direct posterity w^as delayed until he was a very old man ; 
when Isaac was born he was impelled to dedicate him to 
his God, and when he was well grown — under the absolute 
paternal right of life and death in the household, common 
to the time — to consummate the dedication by final sacri- 
fice. The simple narrative of how Abraham took his 
son and laid him upon the altar is too exquisite to be 
touched with the finger of commentar3^ I think there is 
nothing in any literature comparable to the father and 
son on their way to the sacrifice. Abraham bound Isaac 
on the altar, and stretched forth his hand to slay him, 
when he heard a Voice calling upon him to forbear. A 
ram caught in the thicket was offered up by Abraham in 
place of his son. The faith which, it is said in the New 
Testament, led Abraham to believe that God was able to 
give him Isaac back from the dead, reveals the feelings 
that were in the father's mind. He was under the impres- 
sion that in spite of the promise of a multitudinous 
posterity, God had called him to give up his son ; and his 
faith in God was such that he implicitly proceeded to obey. 

We are not to measure this by the light of our moral 
sense. A man who in our day should thus offer a son for 



ABRAHAM. 75 

sacrifice would be denounced by multitudes of men and 
legions of angels ; but that which would be outrageous if 
done in the manhood of the race is not to be so judged 
when done in the infancy of the race ; and it was certainly 
a masterpiece of sincerity in Abraham to give up for his 
religion (that was the amount of it), for his faith in God, 
every hope that had cheered him in his long pilgrimage, 
and on which he had fed, that in him should the nations 
of the earth be blessed. Since the blessing was to come 
through Isaac, as his only lineal heir, to offer Isaac up in 
sacrifice was to blot out the whole prospect, so far as the 
power of Abraham could determine cause and effect; but 
he did not draw back from what he deemed his duty, and 
it was a remarkable exhibition of faith and conscience. 

I call to your attention the account of the death of 
Sarah, and of the tomb at Machpelah. I will read it. I 
do not know where you will find anything more beautiful 
than this account : — 

" Sarah was one hundred and seven and twenty 5^ears old : these were 
the years of the life of Sarah. And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba ; the same 
is Hebron in the land of Canaan : and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, 
and to weep for her. 

"And Abraham stood up from before his dead, and spake unto the sons 
of Heth, saying, I am a stranger and a sojourner with you : give me a 
possession of a burying-place with you, that I may bury my dead out of my 
sight. And the children of Heth answered Abraham, saying unto him, 
Hear us, my lord : thou art a mighty prince among us : in the choice of 
our sepulchers bury thy dead ; none of us shall withhold from thee his 
sepulcher, but that thou mayest bury thy dead. And Abraham stood up, 
and bowed himself to the people of the land, even to the children of Heth. 
And he communed with them, saying. If it be your mind that I should bury 
my dead out of my sight ; hear me, and entreat for me to Ephron the son 
of Zohar, that he may give me the cave of Machpelah [the double cave], 
which he hath, which is in the end of his field; for as much money as it is 
worth he shall give it me for a possession of a burying place amongst you. 

"And Ephron dwelt among the children of Heth : and Ephron the Hittite 
answered Abraham in the audience of the children of Heth, even of all that 
went in at the gate of his city, saying, Nay, my lord, hear me : the field 
give I thee, and the cave that is therein, I give it thee ; in the presence of 
the sons of my people give I it thee : bury thy dead. 

"And Abraham bowed down himself before the people of the land. And 
he spake unto Ephron in the audience of the people of the land, saying, 



76 BIBLE STUDIES. 

But if thou wilt, I pray thee, hear me : I will give thee money for the field; 
take it of me, and I will bury my dead there." 

He could not bury his dead in another man's ground, 
even though it were generously giveA him ; he insisted on 
paying for it. And, with a delicacy equal to his generosity, 
Ephron fixed a price and received it from the lordly chief- 
tain. So Abraham came into possession of this cave ; and 
I presume that his dust and the dust of Sarah, of Isaac, and 
of Jacob lie in that very same place to this day. Over it has 
been built a temple of reverence, and the Gentile is not 
allowed to enter there. Beneath is the original cave ; and 
there is no reason to suppose otherwise than that the bones 
of the three patriarchs and their families yet lie in it. 

The disposition of Abraham not to mingle himself with 
the inhabitants of the lands, not to take on their customs, 
not to dwell in their cities, not to adopt their languages, 
not even to bury his dead in the sepulchers where their 
dead were buried, but to maintain separateness of organi- 
zation and life — this disposition falls in with the whole 
thought and aspiration of his life, to be the founder of a 
new and multitudinous family. 

There is one more history that I shall allude to', and 
that I will not defile with criticism nor w^ith commentary. 
It is a history such that I do not see how any man who has 
read it can wish to tear it to pieces. It is the pleading of 
Abraham with the angel of the Lord when the destruction 
of Sodom and Gomorrah was determined upon. 

I will not occupy the time by reading the account, but 
will beg you to read it as the representation of a great 
soul pleading for others, in that remote period when dis- 
interested benevolence was not known, as a term, nor as a 
fact except to pre-eminent natures. 

If by any this mode of looking at early history in the 
light of modern ideas be accounted unnatural and not use- 
ful, I reply that it is useful in the sense in which the Ten 
Commandments are useful ; in the sense in which the 
Beatitudes of Christ are useful ; in the sense in wliich the 
example of the sinless One is useful ; in the sense in which 



ABRAHAM. yy 

the precepts of the New Testament are useful. The histo- 
ries in the Old Testament of the earlier periods of the 
world may not be thought to be authoritative ; but if an}" 
man is disposed to reject them as not useful on the ground 
of their particular nature, of their special method, or of the 
literary elements in them, I beg him to pause and recon- 
sider the matter. There is not in the history of any nation 
anything more charming in its simplicity than the history 
of the early periods of the human race as given in the Old 
Testament. If there is anything in the history of Abra- 
ham that seems to butt against your views of science and 
philosophy as to what a divinely inspired record should 
be, I wish you would read the absurd Arabian legends, 
the fantastic stories told by the Mohammedans in the 
Koran and in their literature, and see the wide difference. 
If you would see what the human element really w^as in 
the history of antiquity, go back to the Hebrew Scriptures 
and you will find it. Of course, when you go back to these 
Scriptures you will find a vast difference between simplic- 
ity, truthfulness, and righteousness as measured by modern 
rules and judgments, and those same qualities as measured 
by the standards of Old Testament periods. These stories 
are marvelous to us ; it is difficult for us to comprehend 
how such things as occurred in those times were tolerated 
by good men ; but if we could see the circumstances in 
which they originated, if we could go back to the literal 
facts, we should look upon them more leniently than now 
we are disposed to do ; while the very honesty of the 
stories is proof of their truth and trustworthiness. 

Take into consideration the career of the great founder 
of the Israelitish people, and for that matter of the Chris- 
tian church — for the Christian church is but the outcome, 
the fruit of that people : they both had the same life. Does 
it seem to you that this man of God could not fitly be the 
leader of that people ? Do you say that he w^as a slave- 
holder, that he was a polygamist, and that he was at times 
given over to deceit ? These things were not the same in 
that age that they are now. 



78 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Slavery then was not a curse but a blessing. It was not 
a degradation to be gathered into a household, as slaves 
were at the beginning, to be treated with kindness, to be 
instructed, and to receive whatever advantages were 
accorded to the children of the family themselves. There 
w^as a great difference between Hebrew slavery and Roman 
slavery. Hebrew slavery invariably accounted a slave to 
be a man, not only, but as being in near connection with 
his master, and as inheriting or having a right to all the 
amenities of the family. Roman slavery began by dis- 
possessing a man of manhood, and making him a chattel, 
classing him with furniture and horses and mules, and 
allowing him no rights. Under the Roman law the slave 
had no rights ; but under the Hebrew law he had all 
rights — that is to say, his servitude was very little more 
than that of a hired servant. At a later period the privi- 
lege of emancipation was given to him. 

In the early periods of the race, when there was no dis- 
tinction made between a person and property ; when a man 
bought his wife as much as he did his cow ; when his chil- 
dren were salable ; w^hen the doctrine of personal rights 
had not been unfolded, or had been defined but to a limited 
degree ; when the differentiation of society had not taken 
place, the old patriarch held slaves without guiltiness. 
But this is not justification of the modern slaveholder, 
slavery in the early ages and slavery now not being by any 
means the same thing. 

Do you object to this founder of the Jewish nation, 'who 
was a polygamist, being held up as a pattern and exemplar 
of virtue ? A polygamist in these days is certainly not to 
be commended ; we cannot condemn such a man too 
severely : but polygamy was a custom that belonged to 
the nascent race. In the early time, when men were not 
enough advanced socially and morally to discriminate 
between right and wrong courses, it was tolerated as 
faults are tolerated in children until they are old enough to 
correct them themselves. 

As to the deception of Abraham, I do not wish you to 



ABRAHAM. 79 

make it any less than it was, but I do not wish you to 
judge him as you would a man that w^ould tell a falsehood 
in our da}'. You will bear in mind that the animal king- 
dom below us has craft, cunning, as an instrument of self- 
protection with which to meet brute force. Savage nations, 
a little above the animal, retain these traits (indeed, we 
civilized Christian nations have not altogether outgrown 
them) ; and Abraham, though he stood on a vastly higher 
plane in most respects, believing that his life was in peril, 
to save himself (not from any mercenary motive or motive 
of pleasure) resorted to deceit and falsehood. Of course 
the great patriarch- should not be revered for that; but 
ought we to sit in judgment upon him with the same se- 
verity that we should upon a man who did the same thing 
in this age of the world ? 

How is it to-day with war ? Is it not full of organized 
deceit which everybody justifies ? Is it not thought to be 
right to lie to the enemy because he is an enemy ? Is not 
war an organized lie ? How is it with diplomacy ? Does 
it not abound with falsifications, with promises made to be 
broken, with falsehoods organized into custom and method ? 
How is it with commerce ? Look at the rivalries, the secre- 
cies, the misdirections, that exist between those who aie 
antagonists or competitors in business. How is it in states- 
manship and politics ? Is falsehood unknown there ? How 
is it even with newspapers ? Is straightforwardness highly 
developed among them ? Do they altogether account it to 
be a fatal wrong for them to stand up for their party by 
exaggeration and misrepresentation ? Is it not true that in 
many departments of human society, nowadays, men for 
the sake of self-interest justify themselves in the practice 
of deceit ? And is it right for these same men in the 
sanctuary and elsewhere to condemn Abraham, because to 
save his life he said that his wife was his sister ? He did 
wrong ; such falsifying would be condemnable at this 
period of time ; but at that remote age, when the race 
was at so low a level in the matter of education and devel- 
opment, his offense was but as a speck on his garments, 



8o BIBLE STUDIES. 

compared with evils that are indulged in and tolerated in 
modern Christian society. 

What, then, is the reason why Abraham has been so 
great ? One conspicuous reason is that he was the founder 
of the household, and not of a kingdom. He was a father 
and not a king — the father of the faithful — the father of a 
multitude. You must not think of him as in his life the 
ruler of a great nation. He was great in that the house- 
hold was his sphere. It was transmitted from son to son. 
It went down to the nation that grew up after them, and 
from that day to this, one of the distinguishing and mag- 
nificent peculiarities of the Israelitish people is that they 
have maintained the household. I take it upon me to say 
that all over the world the education of the children of the 
household is nowhere more remarkable and admirable than 
among the descendants of Abraham. This is one of the 
strongest points of their history. Their family love, their 
fidelity in the culture of their children, their putting these 
things above everything else, is worthy of all imitation. 
They have brought down from Abraham, through all the 
periods of history, to our time, the example of the family. 
To them we are indebted for much of the dignity and the 
blessedness of the monogamous household. And you will 
find that development and power in their noblest and best 
forms have never gone aside from the nations in which the 
household has been fostered and honored. Civilization in 
its highest types will never succeed in any community 
where the ideal of the household is lost or has never been 
possessed. It lies at the root of every rightly conceived 
commonwealth, and is its foundation. The influence of 
the father and mother on the children and the influence of 
the children on the father and mother are the beginning 
of prosperity in national life. Thus, as Abraham was the 
father of the household he stands high in dignity and 
power. 

Not only has Abraham this claim, but he shows essential 
dignity and magnanimity of character in his transactions. 
The course he pursued with Abimelech was such as to call 



ABKAI/AJl. 8 1 

forth from that king the testimony, " I perceive that God 
is with thee ; " and any man whose nature is so large that 
others, looking upon him, see the force and goodness of his 
being, any man who, in the eyes of those around about 
him, is walking in the spirit and in the communion of God, 
any man whose portrait is universally painted as that of a 
great nature — any such man, even if we had no great in- 
stances of his courage, enterprise, daring, and fair dealing 
throughout his whole history, might safely be presumed to 
be one worthy of honor and of reverence. 

Abraham's personal purity, his self-control, and his emi- 
nent sense of justice fitted him to be the prototype of 
a great nation. His faults were faults even in the age in 
which he lived ; but as he had not been trained to higher 
things, as there were no institutions to aid him in over- 
coming them, his finding his own way out of them in a 
trackless wilderness, his ability to conceive and choose for 
his own the idea of an invisible, supreme God, and his 
establishing himself in a larger and truer life than others 
lived in his time, mark him as a very superior nature. 

Lastly, his faith in God's promise that he should possess 
the land, that his posterity should be multitudinous — that 
faith in the future which was the source of his inward life, 
and which, though he dwelt in a tent, and was a stranger 
and a pilgrim, led him to look forward continually to a 
city that had foundations, whose builder and maker was 
God — that faith ought to be an encouragement to every 
soul that is striving to rise from a lower plane to a higher. 
It is this which gives him his great name, '^ Father of the 
Faithful," and which has made him known even to this day 
in all the Orient as the " Friend of God." 

In that far away period, then, stood the great chief, who 
had all the while thought of life, who founded a noble 
household, and who established in the family an economy 
of consecrated happiness. He lived, according to the day 
in which his lot was cast, not only a notably efficient and 
successful life, but a higher and nobler life than is to be 
found in any of his contemporaries ; for in the midst of 



82 ^ BIBLE STUDIES. 

idolatry, of gross superstitions, of lust, of all that was low 
and debasing, Abraham cleansed his ways from whatever 
was vile, he showed himself to be a father of justice, he 
was faithful to his children, he believed in one God, to the 
end of his life he w^as witness to monotheism as distin- 
guished from idol worship in every direction, and he trans- 
mitted this doctrine to his sons, and through them to 
their posterity, as they have given it to the whole world — 
for monotheism is, even by Moses, its teacher and the 
organizer of it as a religion, referred back to the great 
patriarch. 

There is, then, abundant evidence in the inspired record 
of facts which justify the greatness of soul that has been 
attributed to this grand man, and that makes him a most 
conspicuous figure on the horizon of antiquity. We may 
look back and venerate him without hesitation, as much as 
they do who sprang from his loins. 



V. 
ISAAC. 



•' And the Lord appeared unto him the same night, and said, I am the 
God of Abraham thy father: fear not, for I am with thee, and will bless 
thee, and multiply thy seed for my servant Abraham's sake." — Gen.xxvi: 
24- 

I AM endeavoring, in the Sunday-night readings which 
I am giving from the Old Testament, not alone to interest 
you in local liistories, nor alone to benefit you by drawing 
lessons from special passages, but so to present the subject 
matter of the Old Testament as to give you a more en- 
lightened conception of the sacred writings, and a clearer 
and better view of the doctrine of inspiration, that you may 
enjoy in a larger degree than many people now do the study 
of the Scriptures — particularly of the primitive Scriptures ; 
for we are to bear in mind that between the beginning and 
the end of the sacred writings there stretches a period of 
probably some four thousand years. 

In the purview of the early book, the book of beginnings; 
Genesis, there are three great periods of time : first, the 
vague, remote, and indefinite period before there was a 
history or a record — the prehistoric period ; second, the 
patriarchal period, which comes within the nebulous 
border of the historic ; and, third, the period of organized 
society, which begins with the life, the legislation, and the 
institutions of Moses. Here you have three distinct eras. 

The first deals with the world at that period which 
stretches away back to the beginnings of things and comes 
down to the Flood, and a little after. Of that great period 

Sunday evening, November 24, 1878. 



84 BIBLE STUDIES. 

there is very little known ; and the Word of God does not 
undertake to carry the torch into it and state exactly how 
things were. It has, however, clustered together the best 
thoughts, the best histories, the best views, that prevailed 
at that time, and transmitted them to us, that we may 
have light thrown upon the state of the human mind pre- 
ceding organization and modern instruction. Of that 
great nascent period of the human family before there 
were governments, when chiefs and their tribes represented 
all there was of order, when men were creeping up from 
the lowest forms of savagery and barbarism, it is of pro- 
found importance to know something of what was the 
economy of providence during that era, and what were 
the ideas of men of that time about that economy. We are 
told by scientists of our day that there has been a great 
development and evolution from germinant forms of the 
great vegetable kingdom and of the lower animals ; and 
also an unfolding of growth in social, moral, and spiritual 
elements among men : yet we are surprised to find de- 
scribed in the Old Testament a long period in regard to 
which precisely this state of facts is to be recognized. 

This book of beginnings tells what were some of the 
nebulous, shadowy, imaginary, fantastic notions which 
prevailed at that time. These we do not want to change 
by putting a modern interpretation on them ; we want 
them to remain just as they are. They are the infantine 
thoughts, feelings, and ideas of men — not ripe ones of later 
days. Men are attempting, by straining their catechisms, 
to save the Book, ignoring the fact that there was a long 
space of time when men were but little better than 
savages, and that the Book records many of their unintel- 
ligent notions. 

We have in that Book the beginnings of those evolutions 
which originate in a low state of mind ; and we ought to 
take it as it is ; and any theory that does not take it so is 
false and mischievous. 

When you come down to the period of the patriarchs, 
you will find there ignorance, superstition, immorality, 



ISAAC. 85 

and wickedness, but you will find these mingled with 
heroic traits and great virtues, though without symmetry 
and proportion. In judging of this period you must, of 
course, apply the higher ethics of the Gospel to every fact 
and phase ; that is to say, though lying may not have been 
as really culpable in Abraham as it would have been in 
Paul, although it may have been more excusable at the 
beginning than at the end of the history of the world, as 
in a little child it is less condemnable than in a man fifty 
years old, nevertheless it is lying ; and while the Sacred 
Record never attempts to varnish anything that the utmost 
simplicity records of infirmity, fanaticism, blundering, or 
cruelty, while it never sets over against these things any 
plea of abatement or any word of commiseration, while it 
gives them as they are, it is our wisdom to take them as 
they are. We want to know how men lived at that time. 

Under the false notion of inspiration it has been under- 
taken to represent the patriarchs as free from superstition, 
whereas they were not free from it. It is supposed that 
men were so directly under the guidance of God that they 
knew clearly what was right and duty; but the facts show 
that they did not — that there was no such guidance. 
There is no question that there were men who took dreams 
for revelation; there is no doubt that men thought God 
spoke to them when it was nothing but their imagination 
that spoke to them — noble and inspiring as that might be; 
and the attempt to bolster up improbable statements by 
special pleading will not save Sacred Writ — nay, will damn 
it in the end. You must take these statements just as they 
are, and simply say, " Here, in the unfolding series of 
human experience, men came to a point where they did not 
know ; and they were mistaken in such and such things." 

The very evidence, to me, of the inspiration of the Old 
Testament Scriptures, is, that I find in the records of the 
early days what we ought to expect in those days — 
infantine knowledge and infantine moral strength in infan- 
tine men, and a simple history which reflects the condition 
of primitive morality as consisting of imperfect notions 



86 ' BIBLE STUDIES. 

grouped under religious belief. If, in writing the biog- 
raphy of a child, I should put into that child's earh^ life 
mature thoughts that would have been impossible to him, 
I should make him monstrous in the eyes of men — I 
should destroy the simplicity that is expected in childhood, 
and make a little monster instead of a little man ; and the 
attempt to substantiate the imperfect and erratic notions 
of antiquity by bringing the morality of our day to bear 
upon them, to subject them to the light which we have 
gained, to strain the text of the narrative and make it con- 
form to facts as they exist five thousand years later than 
the time in which the actors lived — that process, through 
which many a man has put the Scripture, cannot but 
have the effect of undermining men's confidence in it. 
Daniel Webster once said that one of the evidences of 
Christianity was that religion had survived in spite of the 
pulpit ; and I say. One of the evidences of inspiration is 
that the Bible has lived in spite of the treatment it has 
received at the hands of its friends. 

From the beginning of the world to the time of Abraham, 
religion, in the modern sense, — in the sense in which we 
hold it, — had not sprung up. A definite and regulated 
system of moral precepts governing the disposition and 
outward life was absolutely unknown, except such as 
were organized by various Pagan priesthoods. When 
men say that Adam and Eve were " created perfect human 
beings," it is supposed that they were like human beings 
who should be perfect in the light of the experience ot 
these later days. It has been the notion of thousands o/ 
men, that they were like a trunk packed with goods already 
made up, and that when they started they had what no other 
human beings ever possessed except by gradual unfolding 
through ages — that it was innate — that in infancy they 
had perfectness as an element instantaneously conferred 
upon them. Any such notion as that is a simple m3^th. 
From the beginning to the time of Abraham, I repeat, 
religion in any modern sense had not sprung up. Religion 
during that period consisted of occasional, vagrant moral 



ISAAC. 87 

impulses. There was the original thing in men, but this 
had only fitful developments here and there, and these 
developments were sometimes right and sometimes wrong. 

Next came the patriarchal period, beginning with the 
high-minded Abraham, and descending to his children's 
days. Religion then had developed so that it had a much 
broader current and a far deeper channel ; and yet, even as 
late as that, religion was very humanly errant. Among 
the Chaldees of Abram's kin it had grown into a system of 
idolatry and priestcraft, from which he had the God-given 
impulse to break away. Even morality was not formulated 
except in a few directions. How could it be, when society 
itself was not born ? Can you formulate morality before 
commerce, manufactures, and agriculture come in to define 
the relations of citizens one to another ? It was before there 
were any conditions such as we understand by morality. 
There was no regular government except in chiefs. What 
are called kings, in connection with the tribes of Canaan, 
and certainly in connection with the patriarchal families, 
were no more than chief shepherds. There was, among the 
people who were to be the moral teachers of the world, no 
government with regular officers, gradations, implements, 
and instruments. There were no institutions of any kind. 
What sort of institutions can you have where the whole of 
a tribe live in tents, feeding their flocks from pasture to 
pasture, and have no abiding place, no unfolding sequences, 
no laws as to commerce, no officers of justice, no churches 
or places of worship ? 

Now and then there was an altar, as a special thing. 
Abraham built two or three, and Isaac two or three ; but 
they were not permanent. They were rude appliances on 
which to offer particular sacrifices. In those times men 
were bare of everything that belongs to society life as we 
understand it. Even the household had not been unfolded. 
Property in persons was yet believed in, as it was long 
afterwards. The wife was bought and the children -were 
owned. And what insanity is it to attempt to find in those 
infantine conditions the type and pattern of modern relig- 



88 BIBLE STUDIES, 

ious usages and beliefs ! They are the beginnings. Gene- 
sis is rightly named. Esteem it for just what it is — a book 
which records the beginnings — not the endings nor the 
intermediate stages, but the beginnings — with their rude- 
nesses, their errors, their lies, their superstitions, their 
crimes, their evils of every kind. Then you will have 
something of great value. You will know exactly what 
mankind were, at successive steps. Otherwise you will 
have a medley, a fantastic mixture, neither old nor new, 
which, whether true or false, right or wrong, will be of no 
earthly use. 

The patriarchs are not to be set up as our models. Not 
everything that they did was right. They were not exem- 
plars for us, nor were they fit to be. They were not our 
teachers. They did not teach anything. Abraham never 
spoke a word that anybody remembered for instruction or 
religious knowledge. He was as dumb as Adam, and 
Adam was as dumb as silence or death itself. Genesis is a 
book in w^hich we see sprouts, buds, and leaves, and here 
and there fruit, but small and immature. 

Isaac was the son born to Abraham after he had attained 
a very great age. It is recorded of those that lived before 
the Flood, that they were not married, usually, until they 
were three or four hundred years old. There be some who 
escape the difficulty, by saying that numbers meant differ- 
ently then from what they do now ; there be others who 
escape it by saying that this was mere surplusage, arith- 
metic run mad, the magnification of the Oriental mind ; 
and there be still others, who, on physiological grounds, 
say (and there is as much probability in that direction as 
in any other) that the nascent human race were a flabby 
product that did not live as much in a hundred years as, in 
the developed and riper state, men live in five years, and 
that they were not as far advanced in three hundred years 
as, in the more compact and vitalized, nerve-grown races 
of modern times, men are at twenty. 'You will find, if you 
inform yourselves on this subject, that by many it has been 



ISAAC. 89 

supposed that the livers of the far remote periods were 
giants either in imagination or reality, but that they did 
not come to their majority and maturity until they had 
lived two or three hundred years. 

Now, in some line of these reckonings of longevity, 
Abraham begat Isaac after he had attained to an extreme 
old age ; and when it was announced to him that Sarah, 
his wife, should bear him a son, it seemed simply ridicu- 
lous, and she, hearing it, laughed behind the door ; and 
when the son was born she laughed again ; and everybody 
has laughed ever since, so to speak, at the fact. So Isaac, 
being born, was called Laughter j he grew up and that was 
his name — Laughter j for that is the meaning of the word 
Lsaac. 

Isaac stands, as respects the other two patriarchs, Abra- 
ham and Jacob, as a sweet and beautiful valley between 
two hills. He was not the equal of Abraham in dignity, — 
in that kind of wild grandeur that the old patriarch had, — 
nor was he the statesman and politician that Jacob was. 
He had neither the enterprise nor the amount of being that 
Abraham had ; for, although there is very little that Abra- 
ham has transmitted to us, and although his history is 
vague, we see that wherever he went everybody stood in 
awe of him, and we inherit his one great idea. He was 
recognized on every side, by his dependents, his equals, 
and his superiors, as a great man. He had an immense 
quantit}^ of being. There are men of such structure of 
mind that, although they add very little to literature, are 
felt wherever they go, and Abraham was such a man. He 
towered up by reason of this native greatness. But Isaac 
was of a milder and far inferior type. Colorless, he was. 
He was peaceful, pleasant, harmless, useful, but in no sense 
romantic. There was not one thing in his life that in and 
of itself stirs the imagination. There was not a phase of 
his character the contemplation of which would lead one 
to an involuntary exclamation of admiration. There was 
a good deal about him that would tend to make a person 
feel like swearing — I mean "swearing" in a mere inter- 



go BIBLE STUDIES. 

jectional form, not profane swearing. His mildness and 
timidity and peace-loving ways ran to the very edge of 
cowardice, and quite over the borde.r of honesty. 

We hear very little of Isaac until he is twenty or twenty- 
five years of age. The chronology of the Old Testament 
is very uncertain and variable. There is no absolutely 
accurate date as to the birth of Isaac, but it is supposed, 
from the tenor of the narrative, that he was about twenty 
or twenty-five years old when he was led by his father to 
the summit of the mountain to be offered up a sacrifice, as 
Abraham thought, in obedience to the will of God. The 
offering up of children was a common practice, growing 
out of superstition, in all the neighboring nations, and in 
one way or another Abraham was made to believe that he 
was called of God to offer up his son Isaac. 

Now, a young man twenty-five years old, living in our 
time, would not be apt to make a long journey to the top of 
a mountain, and carry wood in order to be himself sacri- 
ficed : but Isaac, who was a very obedient son, did ; and he 
was bound by his father, and laid upon the pile, and was 
about to be slaughtered when he was rescued by a voice 
that Abraham thought was the voice of a superior Being, 
and saved from destruction. 

That is the first considerable fact that appears in the life 
of this patriarch ; and although it represents filial obedi- 
ence on the part of Isaac, and his great confidence in his 
father when he found out what was about to be done, it 
does not represent what we should call Anglo-Saxon pluck. 
I do not think my father ever could have got me on to a 
woodpile to kill me. I cannot say that I should have great 
admiration for anybody that would submit to a thing like 
that. 

Passivity, resignation — these were the traits that per- 
vaded the life of this man. His brother Ishmael could not 
have been dealt with so. That child, born to Isaac's father 
through a handmaid, and adopted by Sarah until Isaac was 
born, had a different spirit. Abraham could not have laid 
him on an altar to sacrifice him, and did not try. 



ISAAC. (yi 

Not until he was forty years old was Isaac married — not 
until his mother's death. That same gentle, meek, yield- 
ing, complying nature that he had, which bound him to 
his father's wishes, seems also to have clasped him around 
about his mother ; and her death, although it is alluded to 
b}^ only a single Avord, throws a flood of light upon it. 

** Isaac brought her [the one to whom he was about to be married] into 
his mother Sarah's tent, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife ;_ and 
he loved her : and Isaac was comforted after his mother's death." 

So, on becoming forty years old, Isaac was married. 
Most men, under such circumstances, w^ould have selected 
whom they would marry ; but in this case Isaac was true 
to his reputation, and his father picked out his wife for 
him. I will read the history. It is a perfect poem of the 
transaction, and it gives an insight into the internal 
economy of society and the notions of men at that time. 

"Abraham was old, and well stricken in age : and the Lord had blessed 
Abraham in all things. And Abraham said unto his eldest servant of his 
house [it was supposed to be Eliezer], that ruled over all that he had, Put, 
I pray thee, thy hand under my thigh [that was the mode of taking an 
oath, and is yet in many Oriental countries] : and I will make thee swear 
by the Lord, the God of heaven, and the God of the earth, that thou shalt 
not take a wife unto my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, among 
whom I dwell." 

There was wisdom in that. They were not only idolaters 
but they were vile and corrupt. They were the torment 
and the contempt of the Israelites in all the after period ; 
and most of the defections into idolatry came through the 
solicitation of the women of the land around about. 
Abraham discerned that through such stock as that he 
could not bring to his posterity the blessings which had 
been promised through him, and in which he firmly 
believed. 

" But thou shalt go unto my country, and to my kindred, and take a wife 
unto my son Isaac." 

He was to go back to Mesopotamia, to Haran, to the old 
stock out of which Abraham himself came. 
"And the servant said unto him, Peradventure the woman will not be 



g2 BIBLE STUDIES. 

willing to follow me unto this land : must I needs bring thy son again unto 
i\\.t land from whence thou earnest ? " 

Isaac had nothing to say all this time. 

"And Abraham said unto him, Beware thou that thou bring not my son 
thither again. The Lord God of heaven, which took me from my father's 
house, and from the land of my kindred, and which spake unto me, and that 
sware unto me, saying. Unto thy seed will I give this land ; he shall send 
his angel before thee, and thou shalt take a wife unto my son from thence. 
And if the woman will not be willing to follow thee, then thou shalt be clear 
from this my oath : only bring not my son thither again. And the servant 
put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master, and sware to him 
concerning that matter." 

Abraham's God was the God of heaven and earth. 
Eliezer's God was the God of his master ; afterwards the 
God that the Israelites worshiped was the God of Abraham 
and Isaac and Jacob ; and everybody's God ought to be 
''^ the God of my father and my mother'' Eliezer said : — 

" O Lord God of my master Abraham, I pray thee, send me good speed 
this day, and show kindness unto my master Abraham." 

When a man of great sagacity lays out a wise plan and 
then prays God to fulfill it, it is pretty apt to come to pass. 
And when Eliezer was appointed to select a wife for Isaac, 
he was first sagacious and then devout. He desired to 
select one that was generous, that was serviceable, that 
was willing to work, that was hospitable and pleasant ; 
and so he thought that a test might determine, among the 
women that should go out at eventide to draw water, who 
was the one that Isaac ought to have. He would have 
said, of course, that it was the way '^ pointed out." It was 
pointed out — through the common sense and sagacity of 
Eliezer. He prayed : — 

" Let it come to pass, that the damsel to whom I shall say. Let down 
thy pitcher, I pray thee, that I may drink ; and she shall say, Drink, and I 
will give thy camels drink also : let the same be she that thou hast 
appointed for thy servant Isaac ; and thereby shall I know that thou hast 
showed kindness unto my master. And it came to pass, before he had 
done speaking, that, behold, Rebekah came out, who was born to 
Bethuel, son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham's brother, with her 

pitcher upon her shoulder And she went down to the well and 

filled her pitcher, and came up. And the servant ran to meet her, and said, 



ISAAC. 93 

Let me, I pray thee, drink a little water of thy pitcher. And she said 
[looking upon him and his caravan], Drink, my lord: and sue hasted, 
and let down her pitcher upon her hand, and gave him drink." 

Was there, probably, ever water that tasted sweeter ? 

"And when she had done giving him drink, she said, I will draw water for 
thy camels also, until they have done drinking." 

Surely, to draw all the water that ten camels who had 
traveled for days across a desert wanted to drink was no 
small token of this woman's energy and efficiency ; and to 
do it under the circumstances described in this narrative 
bespoke of not a little kind-heartedness. 

"And she hasted, and emptied her pitcher into the trough, and ran again 
unto the well to draw water, and drew for all his camels. And the man 
wondering at her held his peace, to wit whether the Lord had made his 
journey prosperous or not." 

The damsel was beautiful, and, according to the habit of 
that country, accomplished. She could not play the guitar, 
nor the piano, nor do we know that she could embroider. 
We do not know whether or not she could dance ; but she 
could work. This was an accomplishment very much in 
vogue at that time. 

"And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking, that the man 
took a golden earring of half a shekel weight [he understood woman 
nature], and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold ; and 
said, ^Yhose daughter art thou? tell me, I pray thee : is there room in thy 
father's house for us to lodge in ? And she said unto him, I am the 
daughter of Bethuel the son of Milcah, which she bare unto Nahor. She 
said moreover unto him, We have both straw and provender enough, and 
room to lodge in. And the man bowed down his head, and worshiped the 
Lord." 

Courting by proxy had thriven very well thus far. 

"And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who 
hath not left destitute my master of his mercy and his truth : I being in 
the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master's brethren. And the 
damsel ran, and told them of her mother's house these things. And 
Rebekah had a brother, and his name was Laban : and Laban ran out unto 
the man, unto the well. And it came to pass, when he saw the earring, and 
bracelets upon his sister's hands, and when he heard the words of Rebekah 
his sister, saying. Thus spake the man unto me, that he came unto the man ; 
and, behold, he stood by the camels at the well. And he said, Come in, 
thou blessed of the Lord." 



94 BIBLE STUDIES. 

A man who brings gold bracelets and earrings is not to 
be left out in the cold. 

■" Wherefore standest thou without ? For I have prepared the house, 
and room for the camels." 

Laban had an eye to business all through life. 

" And the man came into the house : and he ungirded his camels, and 
gave straw and provender for the camels, and water to wash his feet, and 
liie men's feet that were with him. And there was set meat before him to 
eat : but he said, I will not eat, until I have told mine errand. And he 
said, Speak on. 

"And he said, I am Abraham's servant. And the Lord hath blessed my 
master greatly ; and he is become great : and he hath given him flocks, and 
herds, and silver, and gold, and menservants, and maidservants, and 
camels, and asses. And Sarah my master's wife bare a son to my master 
when she was old : and unto him hath he given all that he hath. And my 
master made me swear, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife to my son of the 
daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell : But thou shalt go unto 
my father's house, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son. And 
I said unto my master, Peradventure the woman will not follow me. And 
he said unto me, The Lord, before whom I walk, will send his angel with 
thee, and prosper thy way; and thou shalt take a wife for my son of my 
kindred, and of my father's house. Then shalt thou be clear from this my 
oath, when thou comest to my kindred ; and if they give not thee one, thou 
shalt be clear from my oath. And I came this day unto the well, and said, 

Lord God of my master Abraham, if now thou do prosper my way which 

1 go : Behold, I stand by the well of water ; and it shall come to pass, that 
when the virgin cometh forth to draw water, and I say to her. Give me, I 
pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher to drink; and she say to me. Both 
drink thou, and I will also draw for thy camels : let the same be the woman 
whom the Lord hath appointed out for my master's son. And before I had 
done speaking in mine heart, behold, Rebekah came forth with her pitcher 
on her shoulder; and she went down unto the well, and drew water : and I 
said unto her. Let me drink, I pray thee. And she made haste, and let 
down her pitcher from her shoulder, and said. Drink, and I will give thy 
camels drink also : so I drank, and she made the camels drink also. And 
I asked her, and said. Whose daughter art thou ? And she said, The 
daughter of Bethuel, Nahor's son, whom Milcah bare unto him : and I put 
the earring upon her face, and the bracelets upon her hands. And I 
bowed down my head, and worshiped the Lord, and blessed the Lord 
God of my master Abraham, which had led me in the right way to take my 
master's brother's daughter unto his son. And now, if ye will deal kindly 
and truly with my master, tell me : and if not, tell me ; that I may turn to 
the right hand, or to the left. 

" Then Laban and Bethuel answered and said, The thing proceedeth from 



ISAAC. 95 

the Lord : we cannot speak unto thee bad or good. Behold Rebekah is 
before thee ; take her, and go, and let her be thy master's son's wife, as the 
Lord hath spoken. 

"And it came to pass, that, when Abraham's servant heard their words, 
he worshiped the Lord, bowing himself to the earth." 

Now, if this had been the man himself, Isaac, I should 
not have wondered ; for a true man, who finds a woman 
he sincerely loves, and sees in her a return of admiration 
and of love, ought to be lifted into the highest realm of 
solemnity ; and a deep, pure, and true love is always 
humble ; and the man under such circumstances must say, 
Why should I be loved ? Why should such a one as she 
love such a one as I ? But Eliezer felt it for his master. 
Poor Isaac ! 

" And the servant brought forth jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, 
and raiment, and gave them to Rebekah: he gave also to her brother and 
to her mother precious things." 

Courting their daughter, and courting her mother 

" And they did eat and drink, he and the men that were with him, and 
tarried all night; and they rose up in the morning, and he said. Send me 
away unto my master. And her brother and her mother said, Let the 
damsel abide with us a few days, at the least ten; after that she shall go. 
And he said unto them, Hinder me not, seeing the Lord hath prospered 
my way; send me away that I may go to my master. And they said. 
We will call the damsel and inquire at her mouth." 

However dear the life of home may be, when once a 
woman has given her trust and her love, her home there- 
after is where her heart is. And, according to the fashion 
of her day, this young woman's lieart already went out to 
her appointed mate. 

"And they called Rebekah, and said unto her, Wilt thou go with this 
man ? And she said, I will go. And they sent away Rebekah their sister, 
and her nurse, and Abraham's servant, and his men. And they blessed 
Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of 
thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which 
hate them." 

Two great blessings that belonged to the idea and 
imagination of that age ! Let her have a great family of 
children, and may they have power over their enemies. 



96 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"And Rebekah arose, and her damsels, and they rode upon the camels, 
and followed the man : and the servant took Rebekah, and went his way. 

"And Isaac [who all this time had been at home waiting] came from the 
way of the well Lahai-roi ; for he dwelt in tha south country. And Isaac 
went out to meditate in the field at the eventide : and he lifted up his eyes, 
and saw, and, behold, the camels were coming. And Rebekah lifted up 
her eyes, and when she saw Isaac she lighted off the camel. For she had 
said unto the servant, What man is this that walketh in the field to meet 
u& ? And the servant had said, It is my master : therefore she took a veil, 
and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all things that he had 
done. 

"And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah's tent, and took Rebekah, 
and she became his wife ; and he loved her : and Isaac was comforted 
after his mother's death." 

The void was filled. 

If you can find anything better than that, I should like 
to be permitted to divide the secret with you. Was there 
ever anything more exquisitely simple? Did you ever 
come across anything more in accordance with the in- 
stincts 'of unperverted human nature ? It is a pastoral 
poem, while it has the structure, the firm foundation, at 
least in part, of a history. 

Isaac lived, as his father Abraham had, for a long period. 
At last twins were born to him — Esau and Jacob. Esau 
was the firstborn, and Jacob the second. Esau was there- 
fore entitled to all the advantages conferred by the laws 
of primogeniture in vogue in that desert land ; and next 
Sunday night I shall discuss the character of Jacob, and 
shall have occasion to show some of the facts in respect to 
these two brothers. 

I can only add a few words in closing, with regard to the 
history of Isaac. The greatest memorial of his life was 
the many wells that he digged. Some men build hospitals 
by way of handing their names down to posterity ; some 
erect churches ; some establish institutions of civic econ- 
omy ; but in ancient days, and especially in pastoral coun- 
tries where yet there were long, cloudless, dry seasons, he 
that dug a well was considered to have done a great public 
service. Down through the limestone rocks some wells 
were made with a spiral path around the sides, by which 



ISAAC. 97 

one could descend to the bottom and procure water ; and 
there were other wells, from which water was drawn up by 
a rope. It was no small achievement and at no small 
expense of time and labor ; so that to have dug a well was 
almost to have the title of a prince. 

■ Isaac dug one well, and the servants of Abimelech drove 
his people from it. Abraham would have stood his ground 
and kept it, but Isaac gave it up. He dug another, and 
his herdsmen strove with the herdsmen of the king of 
Gerar ; but Isaac loved peace, and gave up that well. He 
dug a third, and I think that third — either the third or the 
fourth — he was permitted to hold. As it was dug so far 
away from the herdsmen of the king that it was beyond 
their interference, he called it Rehoboth {^Broad-place).^ say- 
ing, "For now the Lord hath made room for us." 

Then took place his nefarious, or what is alleged to have 
been his nefarious, intercourse with King Abimelech. It is 
the Abrahamic legend over again : famine, refuge in a 
richer country, telling the king that his wife was his sister 
(lest he should be killed for her possession), and reproof of 
the lie by the nobler-minded king. 

When Isaac became very old, and was about to die, there 
occurred that scene of perfidy and craft which throws the 
light of interpretation somewhat upon Rebekah. I need 
not say that the woman who was courted at the well, who 
took the rings and bracelets, who went home, and, facing 
her parents, told them just what had happened, who 
accepted a suitor that was five hundred miles off, and who, 
when appealed to as to whether she would stay a few days 
or go immediately, said, " I will go " — I need not say that 
she was not a woman that would be very severely gov- 
erned by the mild, sweet-tempered Isaac. I have no doubt 
that there was government in that family, but I do not 
think Isaac maintained it ! 

Well, when he was old, and could no longer see, and 
felt that his death was approaching, Isaac, according to the 
custom and manner of the country, wished to bestow his 
blessing, and all the authority that went with it, upon his 



98 BIBLE STUDIES. 

firstborn. Desert chiefs, like later monarchs, had abso- 
lute power, and could nominate their successors ; David, 
for instance, nominated Solomon ; the king transmits his 
government and authority to his first son, or to his favorite 
descendant ; thus the ascendency of a tribe is prolonged : 
and Isaac w^as to give over his chieftainship. 

"And it came to pass, that when Isaac was old, and his eyes were dim, so 
that he could not see, he called Esau his eldest son, and said unto him, Mv 
son : and he said unto him, Behold, here am I. And he said. Behold, now 
I am old, I know not the day of my death : Now therefore take, I pray 
thee, thy weapons, thy quiver and thy bow, and go out to the field, and 
take me some venison ; and make me savory meat, such as I love, and 
bring it to me, that I may eat; that my soul may bless thee before I die. 
And Rebekah heard when Isaac spake to Esau his son. And Esau went 
to the field to hunt for venison, and to bring it." 

The law of counterparts was in force then, as it is now. 
We love that which we do not have but which others do 
have, and which makes up and completes us. A strong, 
vigorous man likes a sweet, delicate, twining woman for 
his wife. A vigorous, strong, manly woman likes a quiet, 
peaceful, unobtrusive man for her husband. And Esau, 
who was a bold and dashing fellow, won the gentle heart 
of his father Isaac. Jacob was politic, shrewd, keen ; and 
his mother, who was of an imperious nature, liked these 
traits in him. So the father loved Esau, and the mother 
loved Jacob. They indulged in favoritism, which is enough 
to destroy any family — to breed hatred even between twin 
brothers as these were. 

"And Rebekah spake unto Jacob her son, saying. Behold, I heard thy 
father speak unto Esau thy brother, saying, Bring me venison, and make 
me savory meat, that I may eat, and bless thee before the Lord before my 
death. Now therefore, my son, obey my voice according to that which I 
command thee. Go now to the flock, and fetch me from thence two good 
kids of the goats ; and I will make them savory meat for thy father, such as 
he loveth : And thou shalt bring it to thy father, that he may eat, and 
that he may bless thee before his death. ' 

Now a Stanch, honest man would have said. That is a 
trick: I won't ! But Jacob did not revolt from it a bit. He 
was a politic man. 

" And Jacob said to Rebekah his mother. Behold, Esau my brother is a 



ISAAC. 99 

hairy man, and I am a smooth man : My father peradventure will feel me, 
and I shall seem to him as a deceiver ; and I shall bring a curse upon me, 
and not a blessing." 

From the beginning, you see, he had just those traits 
which go to make a politician. 

" And his mother said unto him, Upon me be thy curse, my son : only 
obey my voice, and go fetch me them. And he went, and fetched, and 
brought them to his mother : and his mother made savory meat^ such as 
his father loved. And Rebekah took goodly raiment of her eldest son 
Esau, which were with her in the house, and put them upon Jacob he^ 
younger son : and she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his 
hands, and upon the smooth of his neck : and she gave the savory meat and 
the bread, which she had prepared, into the hand of her son Jacob. 

"And he came unto his father, and said. My father : and he said, Here 
am I ; who art thou, my son ? And Jacob said unto his father, I am Esau, 
thy firstborn ; I have done according as thou badest me : arise, I pray thee, 
sit and eat of my venison, that thy soul may bless m.e. And Isaac said 
unto his son. How is it that thou hast found it so quickly, my son } And 
he said, Because the Lord thy God brought it to me. And Isaac said 
unto Jacob, Come near, I pray thee, that I may feel thee, my son, whether 
thou be my very son Esau or not." 

I think Isaac had an inkling of the boy. 

"And Jacob went near unto Isaac his father." 

It was a very critical time. 

"And he felt him, and said. The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are 
the hands of Esau. And he discerned him not, because his hands were 
hairy, as his brother Esau's hands : so he blessed him. And he said. Art 
thou my very son Esau? And he said, I am. And he said. Bring it near 
to me, and I will eat of my son's venison, that my soul may bless thee. And 
he brought it near to him, and he did eat : and he brought him wine, and 
he drank. And his father Isaac said unto him, Come near now, and kiss 
me, my son. And he came near, and kissed him : and he smelled the 
smell of his raiment." 

The old man was not as foolish as he seemed. There 
was a subtle fear running through his mitid, and yet he 
did not say so. He tested it in these various ways. 
Having smelled of his garments, he blessed Jacob, and 
said : — 

"See, the smell of my son is as the smell of a field which the Lord hath 
blessed : Therefore God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of 
the earth, and plenty of corn and wine : Let people serve thee, and nations 



lOO BIBLE STUDIES. 

bow down to thee : be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother's sons 
bow down to thee : cursed be every one that curseth thee, and blessed be 
he that blesseth thee." 

There is the old patriarch's benediction on his son. Not 
a word of what we call religion, or aspiration, or personal 
nobility, but much of harvests, vineyards, fields, and 
sovereignty. That was all that lay in the great patriarch's 
blessing. He gave it in full faith that the blessing Abra- 
ham had received and bequeathed to him was also his to 
bestow upon his successors ; yet the element of superstition 
is clear, in his belief that a blessing, although secured by 
fraud, must be a blessing still. 

" And it came to pass, as soon as Isaac had made an end of blessing 
Jacob, and Jacob was yet scarce gone out from the presence of Isaac his 
father, that Esau his brother came in from his hunting. And he also had 
made savory meat, and brought it unto his father, and said unto his 
father. Let my father arise, and eat of his son's venison, that thy soul may 
bless me. And Isaac his father said unto him, Who art thou ? And he 
said, I am thy son, thy firstborn Esau. And Isaac trembled very 
exceedingly, and said, Who .'' where is he that hath taken venison, and 
brought it me, and I have eaten of all before thou camest, and have blessed 
him ? yea, and he shall be blessed. And when Esau heard the words of 
his father, he cried with a great and exceeding bitter cry, and said unto his 
father, Bless me, even me also, O my father. And he said. Thy brother 
came with subtil ty, and hath taken away thy blessing. And he said, Is not 
he rightly named Jacob \Siipplanter\ ? for he hath supplanted me these two 
times : he took av/ay my birthright, and, behold, now he hath taken away 
my blessing. And he said. Hast thou not reserved a blessing for me ? 
And Isaac answered and said unto Esau, Behold, I have made him thy 
lord, and all his brethren have I given to him for servants ; and with corn 
and wine have I sustained him : and what shall I do now unto thee, my 
son ? And Esau said unto his father. Hast thou but one blessing, my 
father t bless me, even me also, O my father. And Esau lifted up his voice, 
and wept." 

Which was the nobler boy of the two ? 

''And Isaac his father answered and said unto him, Behold, thy dwelling 
shall be the fatness of the earth, and of the dew of heaven from above; 
and by thy sword shalt thou live, and shalt serve thy brother : and it shall 
come to pass when thou shalt have the dominion, that thou shalt break his 
yoke from off thy neck. 

"And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father 
blessed him : and Esau said in his heart. The days of mourning for my 



ISAAC. lor 

father are at hand ; then will I slay my brother Jacob. And these words 
of Esau her elder son were told to Rebekah : and she sent and called Jacob 
her younger son, and said unto him, Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching 
thee, doth comfort himself, purposing to kill thee. Now therefore, my 
son, obey my voice ;. and arise, flee thou to Laban my brother, to Haran ; 
and tarry with him a few days, until thy brother's fury turn away : [This 
was probably the last time she ever saw her son.] until thy brother's anger 
turn away from thee, and he forget that which thou hast done to him : 
then I wnll send, and fetch thee from thence : why should I be deprived 
also of you both in one day ? " 

She did lose both of them ; and it served her right. 
Her act was an infamous piece of treason. There was not 
a redeeming feature in it. It was an outrage. 

Isaac was a connecting link between Abraham and 
Jacob. The three were the great figures in antiquity. 
They certainly are not to be the exemplars of instructors 
of modern times, but they represent the highest reach to 
which morality, the household, and religion had risen at 
that early period ; and they were men so much beyond 
their times and above their people that they were the best 
material that could be selected with which to lay the foun- 
dations of that structure which has outworn the ages. 
Abraham, with his lofty faith in the invisible God and his 
lordly power over men ; Isaac, with his affection and 
humility, and his placid sagacity of managing and increas- 
ing his great inheritance of wealth ; and Jacob, crafty, 
courtly, diplomatic, persevering, gifted even with inspiring 
visions of spiritual things — out of these what a wondrous 
stock has grown ! 

That I may not do Isaac injustice, I will say that there 
are many qualities that are essential to a rounded-out 
character, which are not needed in laying the foundations 
of a state, and that many a man, as I shall show next Sab- 
bath evening, may be eminently fitted to establish a com- 
monwealth who is not personally a man that we should 
greatly admire. 

If there is to be a nation founded, there must be a foun- 
dation laid in riches. No nation was ever built up on 
sand. Nations are of necessity established on property. 



I02 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Property is not a mere thing of vulgar value. It repre- 
sents the forethought, the purpose, the wisdom, the self- 
denial, the ingenuity of the human mind. It represents 
the conflicts which men go through against nature. It 
represents the subjection of natural law to the uses of men. 
It represents the highest endeavors of mankind in certain 
directions ; and on these states are built. Poverty may 
have excellence, but poverty in a whole commonwealth is 
absolutely incompatible with civilization ; and it was nec- 
essary that the foundations of nationalities in those early 
times should be laid in the substantial elements that result 
in the power of acquiring property. The instinct of home 
was great in Isaac. The power of accumulation, the policy 
and wisdom of maintaining what he had, and the capacity 
to transmit his possessions to another generation — all these 
were in him. In so far as the heroic element was con- 
cerned he was absolutel}^ devoid of it ; but in so far as the 
great elements that went to build up a commonwealth were 
concerned he had them in no inconsiderable degree, not- 
withstanding his quietness, meekness, and gentleness — per- 
haps even largely because of them. 

Not intellectual, not largely inspired in the direction 
of morality, but being guided by faith that the promise 
of his father Abraham should be fullilled to him, and that 
he should be, in succession, the father of many generations 
of posterity, according to the measure of his wisdom and 
strength, he sent forward the blessing ; and then he died, 
and was buried in Machpelah : and his body has turned to 
dust, and his bones have crumbled. 

But his posterity still flourish upon the earth. 



VI. 

JACOB. 



** Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath 
not risen a greater than John the Baptist : notwithstanding, he that is least 
in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he." — Matt. xi. ii. 



John was the latest of the prophets, and, in respect to 
spiritual understanding, respecting ethics or morality, in 
regard to that internal spiritual purity which the Gospel 
contemplates, and according to the declaration of our 
Master, he was incomparably higher than any that ever 
preceded him. Higher, then, was he, than the old prophets, 
Jeremiah and Isaiah ; higher than David or Samuel ; 
higher than Moses, or Abraham, or Isaac, or Jacob. And 
yet, Christ says that the least in the new kingdom will be 
greater than John ; how much higher, then, will he be than 
all the antecedents of John ! — for this is a rule of measure- 
ment, and it goes straight back to the very beginning. 
Com.mencing at zero it gradually and steadily rises through 
the ages until it comes to the highest point in the old dis- 
pensation, in the person of John the Baptist ; and then it 
passes into a new state — namely, the development of a 
spiritual condition which is the result of a direct personal 
converse or intercourse of God with the human soul. 

This sentence, then, goes clear back to the beginning. 
Ancient saints have been overdrawn. We have seen them 
through the golden dust of superstition. In poems, in 
moral treatises, and endlessly in sermons, we have had an 
indiscriminate exaltation of these men ; not so much as 



Sunday evening, December i, 1878. Lesson : Psa. 



I04 BIBLE STUDIES. 

great factors, and as marking important eras in a vast circle 
of divine providence, but as great saints. They were great 
factors, and they did marlc important eras in the vast circle 
of divine providence ; but in regard 4:o their personal power 
and excellence we have been brought up on false, exagger- 
ated, and unreasonable views. The popular conception of 
these men has been strained in a way that was unnatural. 
That which they were thought to be was impossible under 
the circumstances. 

So, when you bring out the simple facts in the actual 
Scripture history, plainly, as they lie there, you are met 
with surprise, and I do not know but with indignation. 
Men feel that you are taking away their God. They say, 
" You are stripping the Bible." No : not of anything that 
is worth keeping. I am correcting your erroneous con- 
victions and misconceptions. I am saving the Bible from 
falsehoods that have been fastened upon it. Otherwise 
it could not stand the shock of such men as Ingersoll, 
whose whole force lies in the fact that he is fighting the 
misconceptions of a spurious interpretation ; whereas the 
Word of God, under a true rendering, would pass unscathed 
and unharmed. The critical examination that is going on 
inside and outside of the church is such that we are bound 
to go back to first principles, and establish ourselves on 
the simple truth. 

These remarks are required, before the unfolding of the 
character of Jacob, in many respects the most fault}^, and 
yet in many respects the greatest, character in Hebrew 
antiquity. As a picture he is less grand than Abraham, 
but as a founder of nations he is greater than Abraham. 
He not only was not perfect, but he was imperfect to the 
degree that if he had lived in our day he would have been 
ranked among miscreants and criminals ; and yet in his 
own day he w^as a man of transcendent moral power. If 
you think those two things are inconsistent or irreconcil- 
able, I hope to show you, before I am done, that they are 
not. 

Wc must, in the first place, get some little conception of 



JACOB. 105 

how far back these men lived — at what point the history 
of Scripture discovers them to us. It is admitted, on all 
hands, that in regard to the Greek people there w^as no 
true history — nothing but fabulous history — until you 
come down to the Trojan war of which Homer sang. 
Then there begins to be some historical basis or foundation. 
Biit Abraham lived seven or eight hundred years before 
that period. He lived a thousand years before there was 
any considerable authentic history of Greece. He lived 
1 167 years before the reputed founding of Rome. At the 
time that he and Isaac and Jacob lived there was no 
historical knowledge, no national history of China, of India, 
of Persia, or of Assyria. At that remote period only Abra- 
ham's own nation, Chaldea, represented organized govern- 
ment in Asia, and only the ancient Egypt towered up in all 
the wide stretch of antiquity as a civilized nation. And 
it was in those early days that Abraham pushed westward 
to begin with tents and caravans his search for the Promised 
Land, and that the history of the patriarchs took place. 

We must, then, go back in our imagination, and ask our- 
selves : What was life at that time? What were men? 
What was known ? What was yet unknown ? And let us 
be sure that we take things just as they are — not as our 
fancy would like to have them. 

With these statements I begin the history of Jacob. I 
had hoped to finish this history to-night, but it may be 
more than can be properly disposed of in a single discourse. 

Jacob was a twin brother ; Esau being the other and 
the firstborn. The first picture we have of them is given 
to us in the twenty-fifth chapter of Genesis : Esau was a 
daring hunter, a man of the field, Jacob being a "plain" 
— or quiet — man, dwelling in tents. War and hunting were 
the two elements of heroism known in that period. Esau, 
then, was a stirring, energetic, outside-living man, while 
Jacob was a peaceful man who loved home. Isaac loved 
Esau because he did eat of his venison ; but Rebekah loved 
Jacob. 

You never would, from this record, so condensed is it, 



lo6 " BIBLE STUDIES. 

get any definite conception of the age of these brothers at 
the time of which we speak. You will bear in mind that 
the transaction which is first related could not have taken 
place much before they were fifty years old ; for Jacob 
was seventy-eight years of age when he conspired with his 
mother to defraud Esau of his blessing, as related in the 
last lecture, — old enough to have known better ! Although 
we have not a definite record of the period that elapsed 
between this event and the previous transaction, which we 
are now to review, we may presume that it was not more 
than twenty-five years. Probably it was not near so much. 

"And Jacob sod pottage : and Esau came from the field, and he was 
faint : and Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with that same red 
pottage; for I am faint: therefore was his name called Edom [Red]. And 
Jacob said, Sell me this day thy birthright. And Esau said, Behold, I am 
at the point to die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me? And 
Jacob said, Swear to me this day ; and he sware unto him : and he sold his 
birthright unto Jacob, Then Jacob gave Esau bread and pottage of len- 
tils ; and he did eat and drink, and rose up, and went his way. Thus Esau 
despised his birthright. 

What was the birthright ? It was to inherit the place of 
his father, and whatever was included in that. As in the 
case of Abraham and Isaac, so Jacob, if he succeeded, would 
become head of the tribe and head of the property ; and as 
there had been no differentiation between the chief and the 
priest he would be head of the tribe in religious matters. 
He would be king as well as priest and chief. He would 
stand at the highest point at which it was conceivable for 
a person to stand among his people. 

Measured by any standard of moral feeling to-day, this 
whole transaction was mean and despicable to the last 
degree. If you mince matters you do violence to your own 
judgment, and do no good to history. It was an unmiti- 
gated piece of scoundrelism — for whoever, in any age, vio- 
lates the great natural instincts is a scoundrel. There is 
no use of putting other than right epithets on such a pro- 
ceeding as this. It was driving a hard bargain with a 
brother, by simply exercising superior commercial fore- 
sight. It was taking him when he was weakened by 



JACOB. 107 

travel, and when he was so faint that he had no fair use of 
himself — when he said of his condition, "I am at the last 
gasp ; I am dying ; and if I die what is the use of the 
birthright to me ? " Taking him in that strait, Jacob made 
Esau swear that he should become the inheritor of all that 
pertained to the proprietorship of his father's possessions. 
Can you conceive of any such thing taking place without 
feeling the waters of indignation roiled in your whole 
soul ? It is abominable. And the most remarkable thing 
in regard to this transaction is, that from the beginning to 
the end of the Bible there is not a single word of criticism 
upon it. It is related elsewhere with the most astounding 
comment ; for, if you turn to the twelfth chapter of He- 
brews, and the fifteenth verse, you will find this state- 
ment : — 

" Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God ; lest any root 
of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled ; lest 
there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of 
meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would 
have inherited the blessing, he was rejected : for he found no place of 
repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears." 

After he had been cheated of his birthright, his weakness 
being taken advantage of, his extremity being the point at 
which the screw was brought to bear, after he had pur- 
chased his life by yielding up his honor and dignity, Esau 
is reprobated because he suffered himself to give up his 
birthright ; and yet there is no condemnation of Jacob, 
Such is the treatment in the Scripture of this transaction, 
which no sane man can look upon except with loathing 
and indignation. Esau, the one that is wronged-, is miade 
to bear the blame. Why is this ? In a purely spiritual 
point of view, looking at these men as representing the 
progress of nations and of the human race, the man who 
had a conception of the grandeur of chieftainship, of the 
priesthood, of the household, and of the relations of the 
prom.ises of God to the future welfare of mankind — the 
man who had these things in his mind, evermore awaken- 
ing a dream of greatness and excellence throughout all the 



io8 BIBLE STCDIES. 

time to come, was superior to the man who had no such 
conception — no ambition of that kind. 

Esau had an ambition as a conqueror of wild beasts, as 
a man of enterprise in matters physical, but he was with- 
out the instincts of statesmanship ; without the instincts 
of a founder of nations ; without the instincts of a man of 
honor. He was low-toned. He is blamed because he was 
blameworthy. On the other hand, while these facts do not 
alter the criminality of his brother's conduct, the spiritual 
outreaching of Jacob w^as a noble thing, though it incited 
him to so mean, so ignoble, so criminal an act. That is 
the inward meaning of the New Testament reference to 
the matter. The act was intrinsically wicked, and there is 
no use of defending it ; it was shameful, judged by any 
code in any age ; but such an act would not be so wicked 
and shameful committed by some men in some ages, as it 
would committed by other men in other ages. It was not 
so blameworthy in that early period as it would have been 
in our day, or in a civilized time. It was done before there 
was any national life or public sentiment to direct or cor- 
rect human conduct. It w^as done before there were moral 
or reformatory institutions. It was done by a Bedouin 
Arab in the wilderness — by a shepherd living in tents. It 
was done thousands and thousands and thousands of years 
ago, in the very twilight of existence. Craft, as a resource 
of weakness against strength, is always developed in early 
ages ; and before the light of a better moral sense is thrown 
upon it craft is not regarded as a crime. In the early ages 
of every nation craft is looked upon as a virtue. You do 
not need to go back to antiquity to find this out. It has 
been so in every past age. It is indeed as really so in our 
day as ever it was at any previous time, though not so 
widely. In certain lines it is tolerated now as much as it 
was at any earlier period of the world. It has always been 
regarded as a trait of genius for a man to be able to outwit 
his fellow men ; and in an age when every man's life hung on 
a thread, as it were, and self-defense was a thing of almost 
universal necessity, it was less culpable than it is now. 



JACOB. 109 

We dwell in a land where we do not think anything 
about personal self-defense. We have armies and navies, we 
have institutions, we have forts and soldiers, we have even 
policemen, and our defense gives us no concern ; but let a 
man live on the border of civilization, so that every night 
■he carries his scalp not knowing where he will find it in the 
morning, let a man be so situated that his safety depends 
on perpetual vigilance, let a man be obliged to hide from 
danger on the right hand and on the left, let a man find 
himself in a society where he must take care of himself or 
be set upon and beaten down by strong and designing men, 
and he will think a great deal about self-defense. 

The first development of the natural man in those early 
ages was to resist violence with violence, where there was 
strength for resistance ; but where there was not strength, 
to duck under — that is, to disguise, to deceive, to resort to 
craft, to outwit the adversary. 

A man knows that his enemy is tracking him : he digs a 
deep pit ; he covers it with brush ; it looks like good, firm 
ground ; he shows himself on the other side of it ; the 
skulking enemy springs after him, and down he goes into 
the hole, and is trapped by the man that he sought to kill. 
The man who has escaped death feels pretty triumphant 
under the circumstances ; and he owes his life to craft. 

That old spirit is not so far gone but that, nowadays, if 
a man had an adversary hard after him, he would resort 
to some dexterous trick, or som.e form of deceit, in order to 
save his life. It is just this that prevails in the early devel- 
opment of the human race, before they have the advantage 
of the instruction that comes from the accumulated expe- 
rience of men, and from the increasing light of revelation 
or inspiration. 

You will find in Greek history that one of Homer's 
heroes, Ulysses, is crafty. Homer chuckles in showing 
how sharp he was, and how he outwitted everybody. 
Many of the scenes in early history are best described by 
fairy stories. I think they are better delineations of the 
condition of men before they were educated or developed 



no BIBLE STUDIES. 

than anything else, unless it be the Old Testament Scrip- 
tures. You will find that in such stories lying and steal- 
ing are not thought to be wrong. The little hero, being 
pitted against a giant, tells him all sarts of lies, and betrays 
him into cutting his own throat, or doing something else 
c'hat amounts to his destruction. With your knowledge of 
cause and effect there is to you an element of inconsistency 
and untruthfulness in fairy stories, but in olden times men 
did not know anything about cause and effect. Natural 
law was not understood then. The theories on this sub- 
ject are a later development. They have come in since the 
Roman era. 

One of Macaulay's essays, which is worthy of your read- 
ing on many accounts, is that on Machiavelli (a name that 
has passed into universal use as a type of craft or deceit). 
In order to present a fair exposition of Machiavelli, Ma- 
caulay gives an account of public feeling in Italy, where 
corporations and dynasties had crushed out the people, 
where they resorted to all manner of deceit and craft and 
cunning, and where the state of public feeling was thor- 
oughly in favor of lying. It was regarded not only as 
smart, but as sagacious, philosophical, and justifiable. If 
Shakespeare's play of " Othello " were performed in any 
Northern nation Othello would be the hero, and lago would 
be despised with loathing, as a base, intriguing scoundrel; 
but in Italy of Machiavelli's day it would be the other way, 
and it would be said, " That old beef-eating Othello is 
despicable, but that splendid manager lago is an admirable 
fellow." Deceit and craft were, according to the prevalent 
conception, public sentiment and law. 

However, we need not go back so far as antiquity or 
even the Middle Ages for an example of one man's cheat- 
ing another out of his birthright, because he has the power. 
That is not a thing simply of the past. I should like to 
know what right England has in India, except the right 
which comes from her power to cheat that nation out of 
its hereditary possessions ? I should like to know why 
England is in Afghanistan, except because she has the abil- 



JACOB. Ill 

ity to force her way there by reason of the weakness of the 
Afghanistan!, and compel them to submit to her govern- 
ment? I should like to know what right there was in the 
confederated nations of Europe to divide and distribute 
Poland, except the right of superior force ? It is a gigantic 
game of Jacob over again. I should like to know what 
right this government of the United States has to dispose 
of the Indians and of their territory, making treaty after 
treaty, violating one almost before another is formed, 
starving them and cheating them by unscrupulous agents, 
and pursuing them with an army whose officers blush, and 
say at every step, " The Indians are right and we are 
wrong"? I think our age is not so far advanced that we 
can afford to be severe on Jacob. If, with all the light of 
the Gospel, with eighteen hundred years of Christian in- 
struction, with the experience of empires and nations, with 
the modified morality that makes our households what 
they are, with the manhood and all the refinements of 
life — if, with these advantages, we can stand calmly by and 
see such things done without horror and protest, is it 
becoming in us to be very much shocked at what was done 
six thousand years ago ? Disconnected from and unsur- 
rounded by any mitigating circumstances, it was an abomi- 
nable deed ; but it was done at a time when men did not 
know how abominable such deeds were. 

But do you say, *' Jacob, notwithstanding, was accepted 
for a great, providential work " ? Yes, he was, in spite of 
this — not in consequence of it ; just as England and Amer- 
ica are to-day. Providence must work with the materials 
it has. If it worked only with perfect men it would never 
work at all. All the way down, God works with every- 
thing that can be made to conspire with his purposes, re- 
straining the wrath of man, and causing the remainder 
thereof to praise him. 

But one modicum of relief in the contrast lies in the 
vulgarity of Esau's nature, and in the ambition or craving 
for eminence that is manifested in Jacob. It is a very slight 
alleviation, however. 



112 BIBLE STUDIES. 

The next point in Jacob's history is his conspiracy with 
his mother to deceive his father, her husband, and to com- 
plete the bad bargain of fraud already entered upon 
against his brother Esau, by securing for Jacob the patri- 
arch's dying blessing, which was the last will and testa- 
ment of the old chief. I read last Sabbath evening in 
Isaac's history, and shall not repeat to-night, the painful 
details of this very disgusting conspiracy between a mothei- 
and one son, as against the husband and father and the 
other son. It was a calculated fraud ; it was a deliberate 
purpose formed to defraud ; and judged b}^ our modern 
standards as applied to the household it has in it almost 
every element that could make it despicable. You cannot 
speak of it too severely, on its merits. 

And that is not the whole of it. I think the most extra- 
ordinary part of the matter is that both Jacob and his 
mother believed themselves to be eminently religious, and 
neither of them showed at that time, or at any subsequent 
time, the slightest sign of remorse. They gave no evi- 
dence that they thought they were doing wrong. So far 
as the recorded history of the transaction is concerned, 
there is nothing to show that in after years Jacob was con- 
victed of this as a sin, or looked back upon it with regret ; 
and yet he was seventy-eight years old when he committed 
it. And nowhere has any writer in the Bible borne any 
witness against the disgraceful proceeding. It must stand, 
therefore, as a prodigious testimony of the low moral de- 
velopment of men in that early age, when such an unpar- 
alleled outrage could occur without condemnation, or even 
criticism. 

From how low a state, then, has the family of man 
arisen ! Do not attempt to palliate this act, except to show 
that it was the act of men in an undeveloped age, and that 
we are not to apply to them the severity of condemnation 
which we apply, in this later age, to ourselves, who have 
better instruction. 

They violated no moral sense that was in them ; and the 
measure of the wrong, in so far as the wrongdoer is con- 



JACOB. 113 

cerned, lies not in the mischief that the act works out- 
wardly, but in his responsibility to his best understanding 
inwardly. Since they were so rude and low that they had 
no moral sense which was violated, the act did not work 
upon them such demoralization as the same act would 
up.on us. 

The attempt of some persons to explain this by saying 
that Jacob acted under divine inspiration, that he obeyed 
the decrees of God, and that it was right because God in- 
spired it, is futile. I do not think that style of reasoning 
exonerates the culprit, and the effect is to debauch the 
moral ideas of mankind. It is to charge God with inspir- 
ing deceit and cunning and with violating the great law of 
love. It does not justify the actor, but tends to destroy 
the faith of mankind in God. We are to abhor the doc- 
trine that a thing is right because God says it. Things are 
not right because God says them ; but he says them be- 
cause they are right. There is no inspiration on the part 
of God of any such doctri.ne as that things are right or true 
because God says them. There is no need of falling back 
on any such debasing theory. "Let God be true," sa3'S the 
sacred Writ, "and every man a liar." Maintain the integ- 
rity of moral government in the universe, and let saints, 
patriarchs, and inspired men go as th^y may. Whatever 
criticism you put upon men, do not destroy the confidence 
of the world in the integrity, justice, truth, and purity of 
God. 

Men are led to this by having a vicious theory of inspi- 
ration — a theory of inspiration that is not contained in the 
Bible, and that is utterly inconsistent with the Bible. I 
believe in the inspiration of the Bible from beginning to 
end, but not in its inspiration in every part alike ; and the 
inspiration I believe in is very different from plenary and 
verbal inspiration. 

Now, as to the consequences of this transaction. They 
are related without comment. First, we have a revelation 
of the effect of these proceedings upon the man Esau. 

'And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing wherewith his father 



114 BIBLE STUDIES. 

blessed him : and Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my 
father are at hand ; then will I slay my brother Jacob." 

It is as if he had said, " The old man will die before 
long, and then I will kill Jacob." * A lovely condition of 
affairs it was — a son waiting for a father to die before he 
should kill his brother ! 

"And the words of Esau her elder son were told to Rebekah : and she 
sent and called Jacob her younger son, and said unto him — " 

What ? Not a word of regret ; not, " We have made a 
mistake, and let us rectify it " ? Nothing of the sort ; but, 

"Behold, thy brother Esau, as touching thee, doth comfort himself, pur- 
posing to kill thee. Now therefore, my son, obey my voice ; and arise, flee 
thou to Laban my brother, to Haran ; and tarry with him a few days, until 
thy brother's fury turn away ; until thy brother's anger turn away from thee, 
and he forget that which thou hast done to him : then I will send, and fetch 
thee from thence : why should I be deprived also of you both in one day ? " 

That was the counsel of the mother — the beautiful 
Rebekah, whose courtship had been so charming ! 

There is another scene connected with this affair. Re- 
bekah goes to her venerable husband, and says to him, — 

" I am weary of my life because of the daughters of Heth : if Jacob take a 
wife of the daughters of Heth, such as these which are of the daughters of 
the land, what good shall my life do me ? 

"And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto 
him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan." 

The good woman judged very correctly as to the right 
line of appeal. 

"Arise, go to Padan-aram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother's father ; 
and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother's 
brother. And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and mul- 
tiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people ; and give thee the 
blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee ; that thou mayest 
inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abra- 
ham. And Isaac sent away Jacob : and he went to Padan-aram unto Laban, 
son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's 
mother." 

So, then, he had got out of the scrape ! The stolen 
blessing was to stand in full force, and he was to be snugly 
married. Well, that must surprise every person of a fresh 
and unvitiated conscience ; unless he is relieved bv the evi- 



JACOB. 115 

dence which we have of the utterly undeveloped mcr^,l 
sense of men in that early age. 

When Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob, and sent 
him to take a wife from Padan-aram, he went and married 
elsewhere to vex his mother, and did other things that we 
do not need to dwell upon. We will go on with the his- 
tory of Jacob. 

He went — in the western part of Palestine, across the 
hills, probably in sight of Hebron and Jerusalem — through 
what was afterward Samaria ; he traversed the valley of 
the Jordan, crossing it somewhere ; he most likely followed 
tlie then track of caravans south of the sea of Galilee, 
stretching up toward Damascus, and eastward to Mesopo- 
tamia and Haran, where Abraham had sojourned. 

" Jacob went out from Beer-sheba, and went toward Haran. And he 
lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there all night, because the sun 
was set ; and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pil- 
lows, and lay down in that place to sleep. And he dreamed, and behold a 
ladder set up on the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven : and behold 
the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And, behold, the Lord 
stood above it, and said, I am the Lord [or, Jehovah] the God of Abraham 
thy father, and the God of Isaac : the land whereon thou liest, to thee will 
I give it, and to thy seed ; and thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth ; 
and thou shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the north, 
and to the south : and in thee and in thy seed shall all the families of the 
earth be blessed. And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all 
places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land ; for I 
will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of." 

There is all the rebuke he got for his sin of unparalleled 
treachery and deceit, for this abominable outrage of the 
most sacred of relationships. It is very fortunate that it 
was a dream. He thought it was a revelation directly 
from God. Like the people of his day, like barbarous 
nations nowadays, and like the under-classes in our own 
country, he thought dreams to be realities, and took his 
dream to be a fact ; but in all this history there is not a 
trace of any consciousness on his part of having done 
wrong. He committed a series of acts which would have 
driven any man out of our society, which would not be 
tolerated in any civilized community ; and yet, in that 



Il6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

early age, before moral virtue had been developed, it was 
so little thought of as a fault that it not only did not 
trouble his memory, but his sleeping thoughts made visions 
of God sanctioning and confirming the blessing. 

When Jacob dreamed, lying, weary from his journey, in 
the open field, and restless, as men are when they dream, 
all he saw was God declaring that by his providence he 
would take care of him, and fulfill in him the promise 
made, that he should be the father of many generations, 
and inherit vast possessions. There was no revelation to 
him of moral government, no disclosure of virtue, no de- 
velopment of the idea of higher manhood or rectitude, but 
simply the assurance of imperial dominion. 

" Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put 
for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. 
And he called the name of that place Beth-el [the House of God] : but the 
name of that city was called Luz at the first. And Jacob vowed a vow, 
saying, If God wall be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and 
will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to 
my father's house in peace ; then shall Jehovah be my God." 

Well, suppose Jehovah would not have done these 
things, who would have been his god then ? This is a 
clear act, by a crude, undeveloped man, bargaining with 
his God, and saying, to all intents and purposes, " I will 
be your servant if you will be my protector." That is the 
plain English of it. 

"And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house : and 
of all that thou shalt give me I will surely give the tenth unto thee." 

Such a transaction in our time would be regarded as 
worse than simony ; but at that time it was perhaps as 
well as could be expected. 

We nowcome to another of those beautiful idyls of the 
Old Testament. Just as men, traveling over California 
mountains, go through rude and hirsute places, toiling 
laboriously, severely taxing their strength, until they come 
to some intervale, some charming little valley, where every- 
thing is pastoral and delightful, where the clear crystal 
stream gives them refreshment, and they sit and talk of 



JACOB. 117 

their hardships, so we go through these rugged parts of his- 
tory, and all at once strike upon the most exquisite pictures. 

"Jacob went on his journey, and came into the land of the people of the 
east. And he looked, and behold a well in the field, and, lo, there were 
three flocks of sheep lying by it ; for out of that well they watered the 
flock>s: and a great stone was upon the well's mouth. And thither were all 
the flocks gathered : and they rolled the stone from the well's mouth, and 
watered the sheep, and put the stone again upon the well's nQouth in his 
place." 

That is to say, this was their custom. 

"And Jacob said unto them, My brethren, whence be ye ? " 

We are to think of him as we would think of a magnifi- 
cent old Bedouin chief of to-day, as being a pattern of 
etiquette and courtesy, and" as addressing the shepherds in 
stately, admirable language. A modern traveler, going to 
seek his fortune, would very likely have said, " Halloo, 
boys ! what are you doing here ?" You might expect from 
him some such curt and rude form of address ; but not so 
with wanderers in the wilderness of the East. Even 
though they took your life they took it with extraordinary 
grace and dignity ! So Jacob salutes these men with, — 

" My brethren, whence be ye ? And they said. Of Haran are we. And 
he said unto them, Know ye Laban the son of Nahor .? And they said, We 
know him. And he said unto them, Is he well ? And they said, He is 
well : and, behold, Rachel his daughter cometh with the sheep. And he 
said, Lo, it is yet high day, neither is it time that the cattle should be 
gathered together : water ye the sheep, and go and feed them. And 
they said. We cannot, until all the flocks be gathered together, and till they 
roll the stone from the well's mouth ; then we water the sheep. 

"And while he yet spake with them, Rachel came with her father's sheep : 
for she kept them. And it came to pass, when Jacob saw Rachel the daughter 
of Laban his mother's brother, and the sheep of Laban his mother's brother, 
that Jacob went near, and rolled the stone from the well's mouth, and 
watered the flock of Laban his mother's brother." 

It was not the only time that love has uncovered deep 
wells. You recollect that, in his father's courtship, it was 
Rebekah that watered the camels of Eliezer, the steward ; 
but in this case it is changed, and Jacob waters the flock 
of Rachel. 

"And Jacob kissed Rachel, and lifted up his voice and wept." 



U8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

That is not usually the effect of such a salutation ! 
Nevertheless, that simple statement is most penetrating 
and revelatory. It is a master-strqke. All the v^ay through 
Jacob's weary journey of probably two or three weeks — 
following upon the exhaustive excitement of the conspir- 
acy for the blessing and the subsequent fear for his .life 
at the hand of Esau — there was uncertaint}^, except so far 
as his hope was confirmed by the conviction of his dream, 
as to whether or not he should find his mother's brother ; 
but when he beheld at the well Rachel, of his own kindred 
and household, the whole uncertainty was dispelled ; and 
when she recognized the relationship, and suffered herself 
to be kissed by him, his heart gave way to the tide of 
gladness which swept through him. His feelings were 
akin to those of men who, wrecked, have drifted along 
upon a dark sea on a raft, and are almost spent, when at 
last, as the morning breaks, they see a ship bearing down 
upon them for their relief, and, in spite of famine, cold, and 
wretchedness, lift up voices, feeble though they be, of 
joy, and shed tears of thanksgiving, and shout, "We are 
saved! we are saved !" And for depth or impressiveness, 
there are no tears like those which love and joy shed. 

" It came to pass, when Laban heard the tidings of Jacob his sister's son, 
that he ran to meet him, and embraced him, and kissed him, and brought 
him to his house. And he [Jacob] told Laban all these things. And 
Laban said to him. Surely thou art my bone and my flesh. And he abode 
with him the space of a month." 

Thus far he was a guest. 

"And Laban said unto Jacob, Because thou art my brother, shouldest thou 
therefore serve me for naught .-* Tell me, what shall thy wages be ? And 
Laban had two daughters : the name of the elder was Leah, and the name 
of the younger was Rachel. Leah was tender-eyed [sore-eyed, it may be 
— a matter of small importance to you ; but it would have been a matter of 
great importance to you if you had been in her place. Ophthalmia is a well- 
nigh universal complaint in Oriental countries, where the glare of the sun, 
the shining sands, and the want of proper cleanliness affect the population 
to a degree almost unknown in Occidental lands. Leah, it may be presumed, 
was weak-eyed] ; but Rachel was beautiful and well-favored. And Jacob 
loved Rachel ; and said, I will serve thee seven years for Rachel thj' 
younger daughter." 



JACOB. 119 

Jacob was pleased, and Laban had made a very good 
bargain. He had sold his daughter at an excellent market 
price — for it was a sale. It was in a day when men sold 
their children. The practice is not quite abandoned yet. 

" Jacob served seven years for Rachel [where, in the English language, is 
there anything more beautiful than the remainder of this sentence !], and 
they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her." 

How love lightens burdens, shortens the road, and takes 
away care ! Love is the universal solacer of pain, and the 
universal reconciler of evil. It is the one great element 
whose concentration and permanence make eternal life. 

"And Jacob said unto Laban, Give me my wife, for my days are fulfilled." 

I will not go through the details of this history. Jacob 
found that Leah had been apportioned to him ; and he 
then renewed the bargain for Rachel, and served seven 
years more for her. 

I will not read the pitiful thirtieth chapter of Genesis. 
It is full of revelations of the effects of polygam}^, and of 
the condition of the family in an early age, with its igno- 
rance, with its coarseness, with its jealousies, and with its 
occasional beauties. In the main it is enveloped in a low, 
chilly, foggy atmosphere. It is a very sad chapter in many 
respects. 

"And it came to pass, when Rachel had borne Joseph, that Jacob said 
unto Laban, Send me away, that I may go unto mine own place, and to my 
country. Give me my wives and my children, for whom I have served thee, 
and let me go : for thou knowest my service which I have done thee." 

Laban was a good bargain-maker. He said : — 

" I have learned by experience that the Lord hath blessed me for thy 
sake. And he said. Appoint me thy wages, and I will give it." 

Then a new bargain was made ; and Jacob, having been 
overreached a great many times, contrived to overreach 
his father-in-law in this case. He agreed to continue to 
serve Laban for all the cattle that were ringstreaked, 
speckled, and spotted ; then he devised methods that 
brought a due measure of the products of the flock to his 
side ; and he did not seem to suffer in his conscience from 
any such reasons. But the great increase of his possessions 



I20 BIBLE STUDIES. 

— of the children of his household and of his flocks — ex- 
cited the jealousy and hatred of the family of Laban. 

"And he heard the words of Laban's sons, saying, Jacob hath taken away 
all that was our father's ; and of that which was our father's hath he gotten 
all this glory. And Jacob beheld the countenance of Laban, and, behold, it 
was not toward him as before. And the Lord said unto Jacob, Return unto 
the land of thy fathers, and to thy kindred ; and I will be with thee." 

It is not stated that this was uttered by a voice from out 
of heaven. It might not have been even a dream. It might 
have been simply a strong impression that was made upon 
his mind, as if it were from above, that he had better de- 
part, and seek again the region of the land of his fathers. 

"And Jacob sent and called Rachel and Leah to the field unto his flock, 
and said unto them, I see your father's countenance, that it is not toward 
me as before ; but the God of my father hath been with me. And ye know 
that with all my power I have served your father. And your father hath 
deceived me, and changed my wages ten times ; but God suffered him not 
to hurt me. If he said thus, The speckled shall be thy wages ; then all the 
cattle bare speckled : and if he said thus, The ringstreaked shall be thy 
hire ; then bare all the cattle ringstreaked. Thus God hath taken away the 
cattle of your father, and given them to me." 

There is an unspeakable simplicity of coolness in that 
statement, attributing directly to God the results of his 
own shrewd planning. Have good men altogether got 
beyond that, even yet ? 

"And the angel of God spake unto me in a dream, saying, Jacob : and I 
said, Here am I." 

So he gave to his wives an account of the command of 
God, as he interprets it, that he should emigrate and go 
westward. 

" Then Jacob rose up, and set his sons and his wives upon camels ; and 
he carried away all his cattle, and all his goods which he had gotten, the 
cattle of his getting, which he had gotten in Padan-aram, for to go to Isaac 
his father in the land of Canaan. And Laban went to shear his sheep : 
and Rachel had stolen the images that were her father's." 

It seems that Jacob's wives were idolaters. The patri- 
arch's own household were in the habit of worshiping idols. 

"And Jacob stole away unawares to Laban the Syrian, in that he told 
him not that he fled. So he fled with all that he had ; and he rose up, and 
passed over the river [the Euphrates], and set his face toward the mount 
Gilead. 



JACOB. 121 

*'And it was told Laban on the third day that Jacob was fled. And he 
took his brethren with him, and pursued after him seven days' journey; and 
they overtook him in the mount Gilead. And God came to Laban the 
Syrian in a dream by night, and said unto him, Take heed that thou speak 
not to Jacob either good or bad. Then Laban overtook Jacob. Now 
Jacob had pitched his tent in the mount : and Laban with his brethren 
pitched in the mount of Gilead. 

"And Laban said to Jacob, What hast thou done, that thou hast stolen 
away unawares to me, and carried away my daughters, as captives takei? 
with the sword .? Wherefore didst thou flee away secretly, and steal away 
from me ; and didst not tell me, that I might have sent thee away with 
mirth, and with songs, with tabret, and with harp ; and hast not suffered me 
to kiss my sons and my daughters ? Thou hast now done foolishly in so 
doing. It is in the power of my hand to do you hurt : but the God of your 
father spake unto me yesternight, saying, Take thou heed that thou speak 
not to Jacob either good or bad. And now, though thou wouldest needs be 
gone, because thou sore longedst after thy father's house, yet wherefore 
hast thou stolen my gods ? " 

Then comes a revelatory scene. Jacob, in a towering 
passion, knowing not that Rachel had taken the idols, 
denies that he has done any such thing, and offers to have 
his goods ransacked. Rachel hid them, sitting on them, 
and alleging a false reason why she should not get up, and 
the father could not find his gods. 

"And Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban : and Jacob answered and 
said to Laban, What is my trespass ? what is my sin, that thou hast so 
hotly pursued after me ? Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, what 
hast thou found of all thy household stuff ? Set it here before my brethren 
and thy brethren, that they may judge betwixt us both. This twenty years 
have I been with thee." 

Then Jacob recounts his fidelity in service^ and what he 
has suffered, and ends by saying : — 

*' Thus have I been twenty years in thy house ; I served thee fourteen 
years for thy two daughters, and six years for thy cattle : and thou hast 
changed my wages ten times. Except the God of my father, the God of 
Abraham, and the Fear of Isaac, had been with me, surely thou hadst sent 
me away now empty. God hath seen mine affliction and the labor of my 
hands, and rebuked thee yesternight." 

There followed a reconciliation and a covenant, and they 
part. Jacob moves forward, and comes near to Jordan 
again by way of the river Jabbok, with varied experiences. 
There he hears that Esau, with his men, is coming, and he 



122 BIBLE STUDIES, 

is greatly afraid. The generalship which he manifests 
under the circumstances is worthy of exposition ; I cannot 
give it to-night, but will resume the subject next Sunday 
evening. After making his politic arrangements, while 
he was waiting at night on the river bank to learn the 
result, there occurred a mysterious scene, memorable for a 
dramatic reason, as well as for other reasons, and to me 
interesting because it has given rise to one of the most 
magnificent specimens of spiritualization to be found in 
any language. 

"And Jacob was left alone ; and there wrestled a man with him until the 
breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, 
he touched the hollow of his thigh ; and the hollow of Jacob's thigh was 
out of joint, as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for the day 
breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. And 
he said unto him. What is thy name ? And he said, Jacob. And he said, 
Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel [Striver with God] : for 
as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed. 
And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, thy name. And he 
said. Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name ? And he blessed 
him there. And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel [The Face of 
God] : for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. And as 
he passed over Penuel the sun rose upon him, and he halted upon his thigh." 

Amid the frivolous and mischievous spiritualizations 
that are taking place in the Bible-reading of our day, I 
present to you a specimen by Charles Wesley of what w^e 
may regard as a sublime spiritualization of this passage, 
and of that most mysterious event in the history of Jacob : — 

Come, O thou Traveler unknown, 

Whom still I hold, but cannot see, 
My company before is gone, 

And I am left alone with Thee ; 
With Thee all night I mean to stay, 
And wrestle till the break of day. 

I need not tell Thee who I am, 

My misery or sin declare. 
Thyself hast called me by my name, 

Look on Thy hands and read it there; 
But who, I ask Thee, who art Thou ? 
Tell me Thy name, and tell me now. 



JACOB. 123 

In vain Thou strugglest to get free, 

I never will unloose my hold ; 
Art Thou the man that died for me ? 

The secret of Thy love unfold ; 
Wrestling, I will not let Thee go 
Till I Thy name, Thy nature know. 

Wilt Thou not yet to me reveal 

Thy new unutterable name ? 
Tell me, I still beseech Thee, tell ; 

To know it now resolved I am ; 
Wrestling, I will not let thee go 
Till I Thy name, Thy nature know. 

'Tis all in vain to hold Thy tongue, 

Or touch the hollow of my thigh ; 
Though every sinew be unstrung, 

Out of my arms Thou shalt not fly ; 
Wrestling, I will not let Thee go 
Till I Thy name, Thy nature know. 

What though my shrinking flesh complain,, 

And murmur to contend so long, 
I rise superior to my pain. 

When I am weak then I am strong ; 
And when my all of strength shall fail, 
I shall with the God-man prevail. 

My strength is gone, my nature'dies, 

I sink beneath Thy weighty hand, 
Faint to revive, and fall to rise ; 

I fall, and yet by faith I stand — - 
I stand, and will not let Thee go 
Till I thy name, Thy nature know. 

Yield to me now, for I am weak, 

But confident in self-despair ; 
Speak to my heart, in blessings speak, 

Be conquer'd by my instant prayer ; 
Speak, or Thou never hence shalt move, 
And tell me if Thy name is Love? 

'Tis Love ! 'Tis Love ! Thou diedst for me; 
I hear Thy whisper in my heart; 



124 BIBLE STUDIES. 

The morning breaks, the shadows flee, 

Pure Universal Love Thou art ; 
To me, to all, Thy bowels move — 
Thy nature and Thy name is* Love. 

My prayer hath power with God ; the grace 
Unspeakable I now receive ; 

Through faith I see Thee face to face — 
I see Thee face to face, and live ; 

In vain I have not wept and strove ; 

Thy nature and Thy name is Love. 

I know Thee, Saviour, who Thou art — 
Jesus, the feeble sinner's Friend ; 

Nor wilt Thou with the night depart, 
But stay and love me to the end ; 

Thy mercies never shall remove — 

Thy nature and Thy name is Love. 

The Sun of Righteousness to me 

Hath rose with healing in His wings ; 

Wither'd my nature's strength, from Thee 
My soul its life and succor brings ; 

My help is all laid up above — 

Thy nature and Thy name is Love. 

Contented now upon my thigh 
I halt, till life's short journey end ; 

All helplessness, all weakness, I 

On Thee alone for strength depend ; 

Nor have I power from Thee to move — 

Thy nature and Thy name is Love. 

Lame as I am, I take the prey. 

Hell, earth, and sin with ease o'ercome ; 

I leap for joy, pursue my way, 
And as a bounding hart fly home. 

Through all eternity to prove 

Thy nature and Thy name is Love. 



VII. 
JACOB AND JOSEPH, 



I MUST recur occasionally to the fundamental theory 
upon which I treat the early history in the Old Testa- 
ment — a theory totally different from that which regards 
the inspiration of the Scriptures as " plenary " and "ver- 
bal." You are to bear in mind that the Bible itself does 
not anywhere declare what inspiration is. It merely says 
that Scripture has been inspired to one purpose — namely, 
" for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may 
be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." It 
goes no further. 

But if you go to the facts I think you will find that the 
inspiration spoken of is primarily the inspiration by the 
divine Mind of the reason and moral consciousness of 
nations and races. It is the inspiration of the evolution of 
moral truth among mankind, of which the Scripture is a 
partial record ; and it is a partial record which takes 
account only of that part of the dealing of God with the 
human race which lies within the channel or along the line 
of the Semitic race — the Israelites. 

In treating of the patriarchal age, therefore, I have repre- 
sented men just as they are there depicted, in the old 
record. It is impossible to read many of the scenes that 
belong to the early conditions of the human race, and to 
those venerated names that we have been trained to look 
upon through the luminous medium of the modern church 
and through all the poetic inspirations and incidental col- 
orings that have been given to them — it is impossible to go 



Sunday evening, December 8, 1878. Lesson : Psa. Ixxvii. 



126 BIBLE STUDIES. 

back and take them just as they were in their low estate, 
and not to a great extent lessen the veneration of many for 
them ; but I cannot help that. It must be. 

I closed last Sunday evening's discourse with an account 
of the vision that came to Jacob in the night. In that 
vision his name was changed, and whereas he had been 
called " Jacob," after that he was called '' Israel." " Jacob " 
signifies a Supplanter ; and " Israel," '' a Striver, or Prevailer^ 
or Prince^ of God.'' Such became his name ; and from this 
time many of the faults of Jacob disappeared, and we come, 
not to a high plane, but certainly to a better account of 
him than in anything that has preceded. It was time for 
a man nearly a hundred years old to behave ! 

We had proceeded in Jacob's history to the approach of 
his brother Esau to meet him, with his men. For, tidings 
having been borne to Esau that Jacob was coming back 
with great possessions, Esau started out to meet him with 
a band of four hundred men. 

The generalship which Jacob manifested here was admr. 
rable. It was not heroic, but it was in accordance with his 
settled character. He was essentially a man of policy. He 
had not a single element of the heroic in his nature. 
He was a man of peace, quietness, and good management. 
He was sagacious, far-sighted. And when he heard that 
Esau was coming out to meet him, being greatly afraid 
and distressed, lest Esau should slaughter him and his, in 
revenge for the past, Jacob sent droves of sheep, goatSk 
camels, kine, and asses before him as so many presents to 
"my lord Esau," from '^ thy servant Jacob." 

Then he divided his great family. Mark the order ! 

*' He divided the children unto Leah, and unto Rachel, and unto the two 
handmaids. And he put the handmaids and their children foremost, and 
Leah and her children after, and Rachel and Joseph hindermost." 

If any fury was to burst upon anybody, the ones he 
esteemed least should get the first blow. Therefore the 
two handmaids and their children were placed foremost ; 
Leah, the wife that he had been cheated into having, and 
her children came next ; and Rachel, who was the one on 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 127 

whom his heart always rested, his dearly beloved Rachel, 
and her then only son, Joseph, came last of all. And then 
''he passed over before them." 

The brothers meet. Jacob had the birthright and was 
the superior according to the customs of that age. But he 
"bowed himself to the ground seven times, until he came 
near to his brother." 

Whatever Esau might have thought of what he would 
do when he met Jacob after so many years of separation, 
his now venerable brother, not taking on any airs of supe- 
riority, nor defying him, but doing the most reverent and 
humiliating obeisance to him — bowing himself once, then 
coming a little nearer and bowing again a great deal lower, 
then advancing a step or two further and bowing still 
again, and so on until he had bowed seven times, and had 
come almost to his feet— disarmed Esau's bitterness toward 
him, if he had an)^ 

I cannot help, and you cannot help, feeling a great deal 
more sympathy with Esau than with Jacob ; but Jacob for 
the purposes of building a commonwealth was better tim- 
ber than Esau ; for Esau was a man not of forethought, 
adapting means to ends, holding to them, and overruling 
his feelings by his judgment : he was a man of impulse ; 
and his primary impulses were generally strong. When 
he was mad, he was very mad ; when he was gay, he was 
vefy gay. He was subject to circumstances, and according 
to his impulses he was blown hither and thither. He was 
well-fitted to be the head of nomadic plundering tribes, 
but was not the right sort of a man to found a nation that 
was to be built up. Yet, for dramatic effect, Esau was the 
finer fellow. He was bold, dashing, and in some respects 
admirable. 

" Esau ran to meet him [Jacob], and embraced him, and fell on his neck, 
and kissed him : and they wept." 

Kissing, in the old times, seems to have been connected 
with tears ! 

"And he lifted up his eyes, and saw the women and the children ; and 
said, Who are those with thee ? And he said, The children which God 



128 BIBLE STUDIES. 

hath graciously given thy servant. Then the handmaidens came near, they 
and their children, and they bowed themselves. And Leah also with her 
children came near, and bowed themselves ; and after came Joseph near 
and Rachel, and they bowed themselves." 

It appears that Rachel was even put behind Joseph ; she 
was the dearest of all. 

"And Esau said, What meanest thou by all this drove which I met t " 

Now, that was nature ; and Jacob had a quick sense of 
what was nature. That must be a very bad man who, be- 
ing approached by reverential women and by little chil- 
dren, can resist the appeal that is made to his sympathy ; 
and when it is made in connection with large presents of 
various kinds it is very likely to come near to the heart ; 
and Jacob did not mistake human nature in this case at all. 
He sent, first, the cattle, and they stood around, too ; and 
then he sent the wom.en in climacteric succession, and the 
little children ; and it touched the heart of Esau, and his 
first impulse was very generous. 

" What meanest thou by all this drove which I met .'' And Jacob said, 
These are to find grace in the sight of my lord. And Esau said, I have 
enough, my brother ; keep that thou hast unto thyself." 

Still he was not insensible to entreaty. 

"And Jacob said, Nay, I pray thee, if now I have found grace m thy 
sight, then receive my present at my hand : for as much as I have seen thy 
face, as though. I had seen the face of God, and thou wast pleased with me." 

It was very well that he had no pride that choked him. 
You and I could not have said that, and been sincere. For 
him to make up with his brother with the compliment that 
he was as a god to him was carrying humility to the extreme. 

" Take, I pray thee, my blessing that is brought to thee ; because God 
hath dealt graciously with me, and because I have enough. And he urged 
him, and Esau took it." 

Jacob did not misjudge in that point, either. 

Now Esau, when he was at his best, when his best affec- 
tions were uppermost, was a very pleasant brother ; but 
Jacob knew him too well to think it worth while to spend 
many days with him. The weather might change. So 
when, in the first gush of brotherly recognition and affilia- 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 1 29 

tion, Esau said, " Let us take our journey, and let us go, 
and I will go before thee," Jacob said to him : — 

" My lord knoweth that the children are tender, and the flocks and herds 
with young are with me : and if men should overdrive them one day, all the 
flock will die." 

That was good shepherd-sense. 

" Let my lord, I pray thee, pass over before his servant : and I will lead 
on softly, according as the cattle that goeth before me and fhe children be 
able to endure, until I come unto my lord unto Seir." 

There, too, was a dexterous and rare stroke of policy. It 
was a timely thing for Jacob to say then. 

"And Esau said. Let me now leave with thee some of the folk that are 
with me. And he said, \Yhat needeth it ? let me find grace in the sight ot 
my lord." 

Here was Esau, that had submitted to a very disgrace- 
ful series of cheatings and conspiracies on the part of Jacob 
to obtain supremacy and secure rights of primogeniture. 
After an absence of twenty years Jacob returns, and, fear- 
ing his brother's anger, he humbles himself to that mode 
of address. But this is to be said: In Oriental countries 
a great deal of such ceremoniousness does not mean any 
more than you mean when you say " Good-bye." Inter- 
preted, it is, God be with you ; but you never think of that. 
"Good-bye," '' How do you do ? " and Good morning," 
are modes of address which, if filled out with their primi- 
tive meaning, would have a very weighty significance ; but 
as they are ordinarily employed they signify very little ; 
and much of Oriental address is to be set down simply as 
belonging to the manners of the race. Even down to the 
present da}^ Oriental salutations by the way are burden- 
somely, and indeed absurdly, ceremonious. Nevertheless, 
the attitude of Jacob before Esau, as I have said, was ex- 
tremely politic, and not at all heroic. 

" So Esau returned that day on his way unto Seir ; and Jacob journeyed 
to Succoth, and built him an house, and made booths [corrals, I suppose; 
fences that they might be saved from wild beasts, or plundering Arabs] for 
his cattle." 

How long Jacob lived there is uncertain — probably not 
9 



130 BIBLE STUDIES. 

less than five or six years. It may have been ten years. 
We have no definite knowledge on this point. 

" And Jacob came to Shalem, a city of Shechem, which is in the land 
of Canaan, when he came from Padanaram; and pitched his tent be- 
fore the city. And he bought a parcel of a field, where he had spread 
his tent, at the hand of the children of Hamor, Shechem's father, for an 
hundred pieces of money. And he erected there an altar, and called it 
El-elohe-Israel [God, the God of Israel]." 

At this point there comes in a view of the social condi- 
tion that surrounded Jacob. The thirty-fourth chapter 
contains, what I shall not read, an account of the conduct 
of his sons toward the Shechemites or the Hivite commu- 
nity. The Hivites were decendants of Noah. They are 
called Midlanders, but I think they might more properly 
be called villagers, as they lived in a town. It seems that 
Jacob had but a single daughter, Dinah ; and, according 
to the loose manners that prevailed in that age, the oldest 
son of the king, seeing her, wooed her with unwilling con- 
sent, and, loving her, desired that she should be affianced 
to him, and sought at the hands of Jacob permission to 
pay a large dowry and make her his accredited wife ; but 
as he had put shame upon her, the brothers felt it to be an 
outrage against their family. Their only sister had been 
humbled ; and although it was proposed to give her hon- 
orable wedlock, — to make her, as it were, a ruler in the 
land, — they utterly refused it. They however pretended 
that if the whole city would submit to the Abrahamic rite 
of circumcision, so as to become members of the house of 
Israel, they would consent. Strangely enough, according 
to the narrative, these conditions were complied with by 
the entire community; but then, selecting the most favor- 
able time, the brothers, with their servants, fell upon them 
and completely destroyed the inhabitants of the city, ex- 
cept the women and children. 

Jacob himself was thoroughly indignant ; the outrage he 
never could forget; but he was politic, and he did not in- 
terfere; he raised no difficulty; and when became to speak 
of it you will observe that he said to Simeon and Levi ; — 



JACOB AXD JOSEPH. 131 

" Ye have troubled me to make me to stink among the inhabitants of the 
land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites : and I being few in number, 
they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me ; and I shall 
be destroyed, I and my house." 

They defended themselves, saying, " Should he deal with 
our sister as with an harlot ? " 

They stood for the moment on higher ground than he 
did. The outrage to Dinah had been an indignity to the 
whole household, and they justified their revenge for this 
natural reason ; but all Jacob thought of was its inexpe- 
diency. He feared that it would array all the inhabitants 
of the land against him and his people. 

He now journeyed from that neighborhood, thinking it 
convenient to get away from there, and went to see his 
father Isaac, who was still alive. 

"And God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Beth-el."' 

To this, and more in the same connection, I shall recur. 
Isaac, we do not know how many years afterwards, dies, 
and Esau comes from the south, — from Mount Seir, or that 
region, — and he and Jacob go and bury their father with 
Abraham, in the cave of Machpelah, in the southern part of 
Judea, where still later Jacob himself was buried. 

Before closing the history of Jacob, we will mterpose an 
intermediate history. In order to that, it is necessary that 
you should have a larger view of the precise state of things. 

From Abraham to Jacob not one solitary step, appar- 
ently, had been taken toward civilization. What Abraham 
was, that Isaac was, only weaker ; and what Isaac was that 
Jacob was, a little more spread out. They were dwellers 
in tents — shepherds. They built no cities. The construct- 
ive talent was not with them. They did not develop 
husbandry. They were not tillers of the soil. They car- 
ried on no commerce. They did not buy and sell except 
at home and in the most limited sphere. Their business 
was in the fields, tending flocks. They had no literature, 
no books, no papers, no memorials or monuments with the 
exception of rude stones cast up upon occasion. There is 
no evidence that one of the patriarchs ever put his foot 



132 BIBLE STUDIES. 

across a threshold. They lived out of doors, or in tents. 
What we call the fine arts were unknown to them. There 
was no formulated religion, there was no religious service 
of any kind, there was no domestic policy, there was no 
instruction in the household or outside of the household, 
by priest or prophet, down to the time of Jacob's death. 
If you would know what was the interior condition of the 
household after Jacob had reached the age of over a hun- 
dred years, read the account contained in the thirty-fifth 
chapter of Genesis. 

" God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Beth-el, and dwell there : and make 
there an altar unto God, that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from 
the face of Esau thy brother. Then Jacob said unto his household, and 
to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you, 
and be clean, and change your garments." 

It seems that while this patriarch believed in the true 
God his multiform household were going to take with 
them their own idols, and continue their superstitious 
idolatry. 

" Let us arise and go up to Beth-el ; and I will make there an altar unto 
God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the 
way which I went. And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which 
were in their hand, and all their earrings which were in their ears ; and 
Jacob hid them under the oak, which was by Shechem. And they jour- 
neyed." 

Up to this time, in the life of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, 
the condition of the household, and their patriarchal con- 
dition, might have been described by the simple term, 
nothing. And yet, here was the ^^^ that was to be the 
eagle. 

Now some other influences must come in ; for, if there 
was to be no other influence except that of father and son 
in the shepherd life — unless there had been some interrup- 
tion, some inoculation, some dislocation — they would have 
been Arab Bedouins to this hour : there could never have 
been any growth through pastoral life. The life of hunt- 
ing is the lowest, and as long as that prevailed there could 
be no improvement among the people. Our Indians can 
never be improved as long as they remain hunters. The 



JACOB AXD JOSEPH. 133 

first Step from hunting is pastoral life. When men depend 
upon gaining their food by hunting, pastoral life is impos- 
sible to them. They cannot thus lay foundations of per- 
manence. There must always be one step beyond that 
before tliere can be great improvement — namely, that of 
agriculture, or husbandry. And it is not until that is sup- 
plemented by manufacturing that civilization begins to 
develop. When upon manufacturing there come construct- 
ive improvements, then the necessity of commerce enters 
in. Agriculture, m.anufacturing, and commerce are the 
three elements through which God has conducted the hu- 
man family, and developed their social and moral nature. 
Such an education did not come in the patriarchal period ; 
but it came through the mediation of Joseph. The history 
of Joseph, which is one of the most exquisite of dramas or 
stories ever read, was the first step of civilization ; and 
without speaking of the later years of Jacob to-night, I shall 
run briefly through this story or history. 

Egypt, at this time, was the only civilized nation of the 
world. Not only was there not another, but there never 
had been. It was before the era of semi-civilization in 
China. It was earlier than the civilization that existed 
under Babylonian and Assyrian emperors. There was on 
the globe but one nation that had institutions and civiliza- 
tion ; and it was necessary to send the shepherds to school 
to that nation. The question was, How were they to be 
sent ? On this subject there seems to have been no divine 
communication, no command of God, no conviction, in the 
mind of the patriarch ; but, as shown by the history, 
the firstborn of Rachel's children, next to the last of the 
sons of Jacob, Benjamin coming after, was to be the instru- 
ment by which it was to be accomplished. We cannot 
trace the whole as it actually occurred. We can only 
glance at it through the incomplete but vivid sketches that 
remain to us. 

Rachel had died. In the thirty-fifth chapter of Genesis, 
at the sixteen subsequent verses, is an account of her death. 
It is matchless for its natural simplicity and depth. 



134 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"And they journeyed from Beth-el ; and there was but a little way to come 
to Ephrath : and Rachel travailed, and she had hard labor. And it came 
to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said unto her, Fear 
not ; thou shalt have this son also. And it came to pass, as her soul was 
in departing [for she died], that she called his name Ben-oni [Son of my 
Sorrow] : but his father called him Benjamin [Son of the Right Hand]. And 
Rachel died, and v;as buried in the way to Ephrath, which is Beth-lehem. 
And Jacob set a pillar upon her grave : that is the pillar of Rachel's grave 
unto this day." 

You will recollect, if you enter into the full poetic power 
of this scene, that when Herod destroyed the children, 
after hearing from the wise men, it was said that there was 
" a voice heard and lamentation and weeping, and great 
mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not 
be comforted, because they were not." Rachel is regarded 
as the mother of Israel, and the figure was that when those 
children were slaughtered in Bethlehem, the very mother- 
form of Rachel rose out of her grave, which was in that 
neighborhood, and that her voice was heard in lamen- 
tation. Benjamin was the youngest son, born at the ex- 
pense of her life. Joseph was about seventeen years old 
at this time. He was apparently the only pure and sweet 
nature in the whole twelve sons. What the other sons 
were is detailed in the recorded histor3^ The terrible 
curse that Jacob pronounced against them on his death- 
bed, his judgment upon them, was a revelation of their 
nature, which was hard, coarse, cruel, and avaricious. 
Such were the twelve heads of the twelve tribes. 

Joseph, being yet too young to become a servitor of his 
father's property, was sent with some other sons to assist. 
It appears that Jacob regarded him with special tender- 
ness because he was the son of his old age. It is said that 
^' he made him a coat of many colors " — which is a bad 
rendering. He made him a mantle which indicated rank, 
and made it long so that it reached clown to the ankles, 
with sleeves that extended to the wrists. It was a mantle 
which represented a certain condition. ''When his brethren 
saw that their father loved him more than all his brethren 
they hated him, and could not speak peaceably unto him." 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 135 

Things were not bettered when Joseph, seeing their 
abomination, went back and told tales of them ; and to 
make things worse, he had two unlucky dreams. 

"And he said unto them, Hear, I pray you, this dream which I have 
dreamed : for, behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and, lo, my 
sheaf arose, and also stood upright ; and, behold, your sheaves stood round 
about, and made obeisance to my sheaf. And his brethren said to him, 
Shalt thou indeed reign over us ? or shalt thou indeed have dominion over 
us? And they hated him yet the more for his dreams, and for his words." 

He got himself into trouble with his father, too. 

"And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it his brethren, and said, 
Behold, I have dreamed a dream more ; and, behold, the sun and the moon 
and the eleven stars made obeisance to me." 

That was a high-flying dream. It made such an impres- 
sion on him that he went home and told it to his father, 
and his father rebuked him, and said unto him : — 

" What is this dream that thou hast dreamed ? Shall I and thy mother 
and thy brethren indeed come to bow down ourselves to thee to the earth ? 
And his brethren envied him ; but his father observed the saying." 

Although the old father had thought it fit to rebuke 
Joseph, he rather liked the saying. There was something 
in the flavor of it which pleased his parental love. 

Now, upon this state of facts, Joseph was sent by his 
father to look out for his brethren. He went to report 
their progress. When they saw him coming their ill-will 
broke out, and they said, one to another, — 

" Behold, this dreamer corneth. Come now, therefore, and let us slay 
him." 

They had probably had a conference on the subject be- 
fore, and the time seemed to be at hand when they could 
avenge themselves. Reuben, the oldest, interposed. Being 
the firstborn, he had the general responsibility of the brood 
of brothers — and a precious brood they were ! He said, 
" Shed no blood, but cast him into this pit that is in the 
wilderness." 

There were many pits, caves, fissures, cracks, in that lime- 
stone country, and Reuben advised putting Joseph in one 
of them — for he meant to rescue him, and deliver hirn to 



136 BIBLE STUDIES. 

his father. So Joseph was put in a pit by his brethren, 
and they sat down to their meal, and Judah, the next, inter- 
posed and said : — 

" What profit is it if we slay our brother, and conceal his blood ? Come, 
and Jet us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and let not our hand be upon him ; for 
he is our brother and our flesh." 

He was too precious to leave to perish in the pit, and see- 
ing a band of merchants, Ishmaelitish traders, coming, they 
sold him to them. In those da3^s merchants or traders 
took caravans down through the southern towns and vil- 
lages, and bought anything or sold anything if thereby 
they could make money ; and these Ishmaelites bought 
Joseph from his brethren for twenty pieces of silver. 

"And Reuben returned unto the pit ; and, behold, Joseph was not in the 
pit; and he rent his clothes. And he returned unto his brethren, and said, 
The child is not ; and I, whither shall I go ? " 

What account should he give to his father ? . A touch of 
nature and of gentleness ! 

" And they took Joseph's coat, and killed a kid of the goats, and dipped 
the coat in the blood ; and they sent the coat of many colors, and they 
brought it to their father; and said, This have we found: know now 
whether it be thy son's coat or no. And he knew it, and said, It is mv 
son's coat; an evil beast hath devoured him ; Joseph is without doubt rent 
in pieces. And Jacob rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon his loins, 
and mourned for his son many days. And all his sons and all his daughters 
rose up to comfort him ; but he refused to be comforted ; and he said. For I 
will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept 
for him. And the Midianites sold him into Egypt unto Potiphar, an officer 
of Pharaoh's, and captain of the guard." 

So, Strangely enough, circuitously, and by an unexpected 
course of events, the first steps were taken by which the 
Israelitish people were to build up a national life. 

The history goes on to show that Joseph's wisdom and 
sagacity were appreciated. Passing by some sad scenes in 
the life of Judah, which are scarcely proper to read in pub- 
lic but which are invaluable as a part of the recorded 
history of this people in their uncivilized and early condi- 
tion, we come to the selling of Joseph by the Ishmaelites 
to Potiphar, the captain of Pharaoh's guard. 



JACOB AXD JOSEPH. 137 

"And his master saw that the Lord was with him, and that the Lord made 
all that he did to prosper in his hand. And Joseph found grace in his 
sight, and he served him : and he made him overseer over his house, and all 
that he had he put into his hand." 

Potiphar's wife, a sensuous and corrupt woman, looked 
upon Joseph with eyes of solicitation, and sought to win 
him to her pleasure, which he resisted, because it would be 
both an evil recompense for the confidence his master re- 
posed in him and a sin against God ; and in that age and 
under those circumstances it was a trait of heroism which 
I think marked Joseph as one of the first in this long and 
remarkable line, that had reached the ground of high 
moral principle. The woman turned upon him in her 
anger, and slandered him to her husband, who, believing 
his wife, threw Joseph into prison. There for a time he 
remained in disgrace ; but as it was known that he had 
interpreted certain dreams, and that the interpretations 
came out right, Pharaoh, who had dreams also (where 
men have not a great deal of knowledge they always have 
a good many dreams), called Joseph to interpret his dreams ; 
and the interpretation came out right ; and he was re- 
warded by being made a grand leader, next to Pharaoh 
himself. 

Foreseeing years of famine, Joseph advised his monarch, 
Pharaoh, to build houses, and collect the surplus of the 
food in the land, and store it up. Then came the seven 
years of famine, and the people, soon exhausting their 
slender savings, began to be in want, and applied to their 
parental head, Pharaoh, for relief ; and he turned them 
over to Joseph. And what did Joseph do ? Had he any 
sense of right and justice toward the men, women, and 
children who appealed to him ? Not at all. Upright and 
just, as we have seen him to be, he was of his age, and 
looked upon the people as slaves or cattle. He sold them 
corn. They bought, as long as their money held out ; then 
they sold cattle to him for corn ; and then their lands ; and 
at last offered themselves as slaves, and he took possession 
of all these hungry, starving creatures. So, under his ad- 



138 BIBLE STUDIES. 

vice, the whole property and population of the land were 
brought into bondage to the royal family. 

I need not say how this looks to us now. It did not 
look so to him then. At that time the ideas w^ere not born 
which in our day we are proud of, and on which our pros- 
perity rests. This history is of a man, and of a man stand- 
ing high on moral principle, but living in a period before 
the true inspiration of the race had developed those lofty 
conceptions of the value of the individual man and of the 
rights of the people which prevail in the present age of 
civilization. 

It came to pass while Joseph was thus engaged, that the 
famine — before it had driven the whole body of the" peo- 
ple of Egypt into the snare and toils of the royal family, 
but while yet the Egyptian granaries were full — reached 
northward, or northeastward, and was felt in Palestine ; 
and it was determined to send down to Egypt for corn. 
So Joseph's brethren went down. I do not know as I can 
read all of this. I never did succeed in reading the whole 
of Joseph's life without having my voice stagger a good 
deal. 

" And Joseph's ten brethren went down to buy corn in Egypt. But 
Benjamin, Joseph's brother, Jacob sent not with his brethren ; for he said, 
Lest peradventure mischief befall him. And the sons of Israel came to buy 
corn amongf those that came ; for the famine was in the land of Canaan. 

"And Joseph was the governor over the land, and he it was that sold to 
all the people of the land : and Joseph's brethren came, and bowed down 
themselves before him with their faces to the earth. And Joseph saw his 
brethren, he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spake 
roughly unto them ; and he said unto them, Whence come ye ? And they 
said, From the land of Canaan to buy food. And Joseph knew his breth- 
ren, but they knew not him. And Joseph remembered the dreams which 
he dreamed of them, and said unto them, Ye are spies ; to see the naked- 
ness of the land ye are come. And they said unto him, Nay, my lord, but 
to buy food are thy servants come. We are all one man's sons ; we are true 
men, thy servants are no spies. And he said unto them, Nay, but to see the 
nakedness of the land ye are come. And they said, Thy servants are twelve 
brethren, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan ; and, behold, the 
youngest is this day with our father, and one is not. And Joseph said unto 
them, That is it that I spake unto you, saying. Ye are spies : hereby ye 
shall be proved : by the life of Pharaoh ye shall not go forth hence, except 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 139 

your youngest brother come hither. Send one of you, and let him fetch 
your brother, and ye shall be kept in prison, that your words may be proved, 
whether there be any truth in you : or else by the life of Pharaoh surely ye 
are spies. And he put them all together into ward three days. 

"And Joseph said unto them the third day, This do and live ; for I fear 
God : If ye be true men, let one of your brethren be bound in the house of 
your prison : go ye, carry corn for the famine of your houses : but bring 
your youngest brother unto me ; so shall your words be verified, and ye 
shall not die. And they did so." 

Now comes the after part of the brutality of these men. 

"And they said one to another, We are verily guilty concerning our 
brother, in that we saw the anguish of his soul, when he besought us, and 
we would not hear ; therefore is this distress come upon us." 

Thousands of men, in the midst of their wickedness, 
have no conscience at all, but when they are caught, and 
the legitimate results of wrongdoing begin to distill fear 
on them, that rouses conscience in them ; and they see the 
nature of cause and effect. 

"And Reuben answered them, saying, Spake I not unto you, saying, Do 
not sin against the child ; and ye would not hear ? therefore, behold, also 
his blood is required. And they knew not that Joseph understood them ; 
for he spake unto them by an interpreter. And he turned himself about 
from them, and wept ; and returned to them again, and communed with 
them, and took from them Simeon, and bound him before their eyes. Then 
Joseph commanded to fill their sacks with corn, and to restore every man's 
money into his sack, and to give them provision for the way : and thus did 
he unto them. And they laded their asses with the corn, and departed 
thence. And as one of them opened his sack to give his ass provender in 
the inn, he espied his money ; for, behold, it was in his sack's mouth. And 
he said unto his brethren. My money is restored ; and, lo, it is even in my 
sack ; and their heart failed them, and they were afraid, saying one to 
another, What is this that God hath done unto us ? " 

They went back to their father, Jacob, and gave him an 
account of their treatment, telling him that they had been 
severely handled. 

" The man, who is the lord of the land, spake roughly to us, and took us 
for spies of the country. And we said unto him, We are true men ; we are 
no spies: we be twelve brethren, sons of our father; one is not, and the 
youngest is this day with our father in the land of Canaan. And the man, 
the lord of the country, said unto us, Hereby shall I know that ye are true 
men ; leave one of your brethren here with me, and take food for the fam- 
ine of your households, and be gone : and bring your youngest brother 



I40 BIBLE STUDIES. 

unto me : then shall I know that ye are no spies, but that ye are true men : 
so will I deliver you your brother, and ye shall traffic in the land." 

They give their father an account, also, of their finding 
in their sacks the money that they had paid. 

"And Jacob their father said unto them, Me have ye bereaved of my 
children : Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin 
away : all these things are against me. And Reuben spake unto his father, 
saying, Slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee: deliver him into my 
hand, and I will bring him to thee again. And he said. My son shall not 
go down with you ; for his brother is dead, and he is left alone : if mischief 
befall him by the way in the which ye go, then shall ye bring down my gray 
hairs with sorrow to the grave." 

Whatever else Jacob was, or was not, he was a father. 
So they abode at home. But the famine continued, and 
pressed them, so that the father told them to go down again 
to Egypt for food. They replied that they could not go 
without Benjamin. 

"And Israel said, Wherefore dealt ye so ill with me, as to tell the man 
whether ye had yet a brother 1 And they said, The man asked us straitly 
of our state, and of our kindred, saying. Is your father yet alive ? have ye 
another brother ? and we told him according to the tenor of his words : 
could we certainly know that he would say. Bring your brother down ? 

"And Judah said unto Israel his father. Send the lad with me, and we 
will arise and go; that we may live, and not die, both we, and thou, and also 
our little ones. I will be surety for him ; of my hand shalt thou require 
him : if I bring him not unto thee, and set him before thee, then let me bear 
the blame forever : for except we had lingered, surely now we had returned 
this second time. 

"And their father Israel said unto them. If it must be so now, do this ; 
take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels, and carry down the man 
a present, a little balm, and a little honey, spices, and myrrh, nuts, and 
almonds : and take double money in your hand ; and the money that was 
brought again in the mouth of your sacks, carry it again in your hand ; per- 
adventure it was an oversight : take also your brother, and arise, go again 
unto the man : and God Almighty give you mercy before the man, that he 
may send away your other brother, and Benjamin. If I be bereaved of my 
children, I am bereaved. 

"And the men took that present, and they took double money in their 
hand, and Benjamin ; and rose up, and went down to Eg5''pt, and stood 
before Joseph. And when Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the 
ruler of his house. Bring these men home, and slay, and make ready ; for 
these men shall dine with me at noon. And the man did as Josepb .bade ; 
and the man brought the men into Joseph's house. 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 141 

"And the men were afraid, because they were brought into Joseph's 
house ; and they said, Because of the money that was returned in our sacks 
at the first time are we brought in ; that he may seek occasion against us, 
and fall upon us, and take us for bondmen, and our asses. And they came 
near to the steward of Joseph's house, and they communed with him at the 
door of the house, and said, O sir, we came indeed down at the first time to 
buy food : and it came to pass, when we came to the inn, that we opened 
our sacks, and, behold, every man's money was in the mouth of his sack, 
our money in full weight : and we have brought it again in our hand. And 
other money have we brought down in our hands to buy food : we cannot 
tell who put our money in our sacks. And he said. Peace be to you, fear 
not : your God, and the God of your father, hath given you treasure in your 
sacks : I had your money. And he brought Simeon out unto them. 

"And the man brought the men into Joseph's house, and gave them water, 
and they washed their feet ; and he gave their asses provender. And they 
made ready the present against Joseph came at noon : for they heard that 
they should eat bread there. 

"And when Joseph came home, they brought him the present which was 
in their hand into the house, -and bowed themselves to him to the earth. 
And he asked them of their welfare, and said, Is your father well, the old 
man of whom ye spake .'' Is he yet alive ? And they answered, Thy servant 
our father is in good health, he is yet alive. And they bowed down their 
heads, and made obeisance. And he lifted up his eyes, and saw his brother 
Benjamin, his mother's son, and said, Is this your younger brother, of whom 
ye spake unto me ? And he said, God be gracious unto thee, my son. 

"And Joseph made haste ; for his bowels did yearn upon his brother : 
and he sought where to weep ; and he entered into his chamber, and wept 
there. And he washed his face, and went out, and refrained himself, and 
said, Set on bread." 

Then he feasted with them, taking pains to pay special 
attention to Benjamin, to see if there lurked toward him 
the same animosity he had experienced, on the part of the 
brethren. Then he sent them away. 

"And lie commanded the steward of his house, saying. Fill the men's 
sacks with food, as much as they can carry, and put every man's money in 
his sack's mouth. And put my cup, the silver cup, in the sack's mouth of 
the youngest, and his corn money. And he did according to the word that 
Joseph had spoken. 

"As soon as the morning was light, the men were sent away, they and 
their asses. And when they were gone out of the city, and not yet far off, 
Joseph said unto his steward. Up, follow after the men; and when thou 
dost overtake them, say unto them. Wherefore have ye rewarded evil for 
good ? Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and whereby indeed he divin- 
eth ? ye have done evil in so doing. 



142 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"And he overtook them, and he spake unto them these same words. 
And they said unto him, Wherefore saith my lord these words? God for- 
bid that thy servants should do according to this thing. Behold, the money 
which we found in our sacks' mouth we brought again unto thee out of the 
land of Canaan : how then should we steal out of thy lord's house silver or 
gold t With whomsoever of thy servants it be found, both let him die, and 
we also will be my lord's bondmen. And he said. Now also let it be accord- 
ing unto your words : he with whom it is found shall be my servant; and 
ye shall be blameless. Then they speedily took down every man his sack 
to the ground, and opened every man his sack. And he searched, and 
began at the eldest, and left at the youngest : and the cup was found in Ben- 
jamin's sack. 

" Then they rent their clothes, and laded every man his ass, and returned 
to the city. And Judah and his brethren came to Joseph's house ; for he 
was yet there : and they fell before him on the ground. 

"And Joseph said unto them, What deed is this that ye have done ? wot 
ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine ? And Judah said. What 
shall we say unto my lord ? what shall we speak ? or how shall we clear 
ourselves ? God hath found out the iniquity of thy servants : behold, we 
are my lord's servants, both we, and he also with whom the cup is found. 
And he said, God forbid that I should do so : but the man in whose hand 
the cup is found, he shall be my servant ; and as for you, get you up in 
peace unto your father. 

" Then Judah came near unto him, and said, Oh my lord, let thy servant, 
I pray thee, speak a word in my lord's ears, and let not thine anger burn 
against thy servant : for thou art even as Pharaoh. My lord asked his 
servants, saying. Have ye a father, or a brother .'' And we said unto my 
lord. We have a father, an old man, and a child of his old age, a little one ; 
and his brother is dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his father 
loveth him. And thou saidst unto thy servants. Bring him down unto me, 
that I may set mine eyes upon him. And we said unto my lord, The lad 
cannot leave his father: for if he should leave his father, his father would 
die. And thou saidst unto thy servants, Except your youngest brother 
come down with you, ye shall see my face no more. And it came to pass 
when we came up unto thy servant my father, we told him the words of my 
lord. And our father said, Go again, and buy us a little food. And we said. 
We cannot go down : if our youngest brother be with us, then will we go 
down : for we may not see the man's face, except our youngest brother be 
with us. And thy servant my father said unto us. Ye know that my wife 
bare me two sons : and the one went out from me, and I said, Surely he is 
torn in pieces; and I saw him not since ; and if ye take this also from me, 
and mischief befall him, ye shall bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to 
the grave. Now therefore when I come to thy servant my father, and the 
lad be not with us ; seeing that his life is bound up in the lad's life ; it shall 
come to pass, when he seeth that the lad is not with us, that he will die : 
and thy servants shall bring down the gray hairs of thy servant our father 



JACOB AND JOSEPH. 143 

with sorrow to the grave. For thy servant became surety for the lad unto 
my father, saying, If 1 bring him not unto thee, then I shall bear the blame 
to my father for ever. Now therefore, I pray thee, let thy servant abide 
instead of the lad a bondman to my lord; and let the lad go up with his 
brethren. For how shall I go up to my father, and the lad be not with me ? 
lest peradventure I see the evil that shall come on my father." 

Joseph had proved his brethren pretty well, and found 
that they were better men than might have been supposed, 
and that they had a loving reverence and natural affec- 
tion for their father. 

" Then Joseph could not refrain himself before all them that stood by him ; 
and he cried, Cause every man to go out from me. And there stood no man 
with him, while Jose^Dh made himself known unto his brethren. And he 
wept aloud: and the Egyptians and the house of. Pharaoh heard. And 
Joseph said unto his brethren, I am Joseph ; doth my father yet live t And 
his brethren could not answer him : for they were troubled at his presence. 
And Joseph said unto his brethren. Come near to me, I pray you. And 
they came near. And he said, I am Joseph your brother, whom ye sold 
into Egypt. Now therefore be not grieved, nor angry with yourselves, that 
ye sold me hither : for God did send me before you to preserve life." 

With many other gracious words he comforted them, he 
clothed them, he made a royal feast for them, and he sent 
them back to the father, to tell him all that was done, and 
bring the old man himself down to Egypt. 

And so these wandering clans, these tribes that were 
the nomads of the desert, who after three hundred years 
had not taken a step in advance, were by this strange 
route, this romantic history, brought down into Egypt to 
receive, through the next four hundred years, the rudi- 
ments of that knowledge by which they were to become a 
nation to which the whole civilized world is indebted for 
its best laws, its noblest morality, its sweetest domestic 
affections, and its profoundest aspirations ! From so lowly 
a beginning did there ever spring so grand a result in pos- 
terity ? 

As a seed no bigger than a grain of mustard seed, the 
smallest of all seeds, cast into the earth, grows and be- 
comes a tree so large that the fowls of the air sit in its 
branches, so this rude nucleus, this warfare of wild pas- 
sions, this wandering tribe of raw, rash men, developed at 



144 BIBLE STUDIES. 

last a civilization founded, not upon art nor upon the intel- 
lect as in Greece, not upon organization and iron power 
as in Rome, but upon the deepest moral convictions of 
which human nature is capable. 

Next Sabbath evening I propose to give some account of 
the closing scenes of the life of Joseph, and also of the 
history of the Israelites in Egypt. 

This has brought us to the beginnings of what may be 
called the sound historical ground — the formation of in- 
stitutions and the Mosaic economy ; and through these I 
shall go with such haste as is compatible w^ith a fair con- 
ception of the benefits conferred by that economy upon 
the whole human family. 



VIII. 
JOSEPH. 



I SHALL endeavor, to-night, to conclude what remarks I 
have to make on the first book of the Old Testament 
Scriptures — the book of Genesis — the book of the origins 
or beginnings of things. 

Last Sunday night we closed with the account of the 
disclosure of Joseph to his brethren when famine drove 
them down to Egypt. In all literature there is not a more 
exquisite little interlude of history than that. To-night I 
begin with the tidings which went up with them on their 
return to the old man, their father, now over a hundred 
years of age, sitting in his tent, surrounded by his flocks and 
his serving men in Palestine. It was the saddest message, 
and the most joyful, that men ever carried to men. 

The patriarchs, as they are called, — the twelve heads of 
the twelve tribes, — were obliged to go back to their father 
and narrate to him the history of their wickedness, their 
unnatural crime against their brother Joseph, and the still 
more heinous and cruel act against their father Jacob, 
whose sufferings they had with sealed lips caused through 
the years, when they let him know that the beloved of his 
heart, the firstborn of the dearest one, Rachel, was still 
alive. The time had come. 

"And they went up out of Egypt, and came into the land of Canaan unto 
Jacob their father, and told him, saying, Joseph is yet alive, and he is 
governor over all the land of Egypt. And Jacob's heart fainted [stopped, 
it IS in the original], for he believed them not." 

No words can paint a natural phenomenon more exquis- 
itely. 



Sunday evening, December 15, 1878. Lesson : Psa. cxlvii. 
10 



146 BIBLE STUDIES. 

The child has been away from home since he was six 
years old, upon the sea or land ; for fifteen or twenty years 
he has not been heard from, and is given up for dead. No 
tidings have come from him until some day in winter, when, 
as twilight is falling, he enters his father's house, where 
his mother, old and trembling, sees him, and sees him not. 
The father, gasping, says, " You are not my son ! " When 
he says, " Mother, mother, I am your son," she neither be- 
lieves him nor disbelieves him. Joy is sometimes so great 
that we cannot believe that it is joy to us, and we thrust it 
away as if it were a dream and an imposition. 

"And Jacob's heart fainted, for he believed them not. And they told him 
all the words of Joseph, which he had said unto them : and when he saw the 
wagons which Joseph had sent to carry him, the spirit of Jacob their father 
revived." 

How characteristic still ! The sense of property in the 
old patriarch was always a very keen sense. He would 
not believe his boys, and he had good reason to doubt 
them ; but when he saw the property, that convmced him. 

"And Israel said, It is enough ; Joseph my son is yet alive : I will go and 
see him before I die." 

They went down to Egypt. 

"And they took their cattle, and their goods, which they had gotten in the 
land of Canaan, and came into Egypt, Jacob, and all his seed with him : his 
sons, and his sons' sons with him, his daughters, and his sons' daughters, 
and all his seed brought he with him into Egypt." 

Then follows the enumeration of them all. I am per- 
sonally interested in one fact only. After mentioning the 
rest he comes down to Joseph's children — Manasseh and 
Ephraim ; then he names the sons of Benjamin — Belah, 
Becker, etc. It is always a matter of profound interest for 
one to be able to trace his genealogy ! 

"And he [Jacob] sent Judah before him unto Joseph, to direct his face 
unto Goshen." 

There has been some dispute (of course there has ; there 
never did anything happen in the world that there was not 
some dispute about) as to where Goshen was. The best 
and most recent authorities, and I think the strong proba- 



JOSEPH. 147 

bilities, place it upon the east side of the delta of the Nile 
in lower Egypt. It was not included in Egypt proper. 
Although it belonged to Egypt, it was a strip of territory 
extending about thirty miles, indefinitely, north or south, 
or east or west, between the delta of the Nile and the great 
wilderness beyond. It was a pastoral country, and was 
on that account in the possession of the horsemen of 
Pharaoh, with his cattle. There the king had directed Jo- 
seph to bring his father. 

"And Joseph made ready his chariot, and went up to meet Israel his 
father, to Goshen, and presented himself unto him ; and he fell on his neck, 
and wept on his neck a good while." 

A silent scene — a scene to be thought of ; but not in any 
way to be disturbed by exposition. 

"And [at last] Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me die, since I have seen 
thy face, because thou art yet alive." 

He felt as though after this there could be no other 
blessing half so great. He had reached the climax of 
earthly joy. Why should he not die in the blessedness of 
that moment ? It was that same feeling that inspired 
Simeon, in later days, when he said, "Lord, now lettest thou 
thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word : for 
mine eyes have seen thy salvation." 

"And Joseph said unto his brethren, and unto his father's house, I 
will go up, and shew Pharaoh, and say unto him. My brethren, and my 
father's house, which were in the land of Canaan, are come unto me ; and 
the men are shepherds, for their trade hath been to feed cattle ; and they 
have brought their flocks, and their herds, and all that they have. And it 
shill come to pass, when Pharaoh shall call you, and shall say. What is 
your occupation? that )'e shall say, Thy servants' trade hath been about 
cattle from our youth even until now, both we, and also our fathers : that ye 
may dwell in the land of Goshen." 

Then the compiler adds : — 

" For every shepherd is an abomination unto the Egyptians." 

That is to say, the pastoral life was next to the lowest. 
The hunter's life only was one step below it. The Egyptians 
were highly refined and cultivated — the only cultivated 
people on the globe ; and they looked down on any man 



148 BIBLE STUDIES, 

whose business was lowly. We have terms that convey the 
contempt they felt. When we speak of a cowherd or 
swineherd we use language which implies that Norman 
contempt of Saxon in which the artificers and agricultur- 
ists of Egypt indulged towards the wandering herdsmen 
of the plains, and which I have no doubt they expressed 
in good round Egyptian words. 

It has been supposed, however, that Joseph's Pharaoh 
was of that Semitic race of Shepherd Kings who overran 
Egypt, and ruled tyrannically there for several hundred 
years ; and that he welcomed these shepherds from 
Canaan as likely to be friends of his dynasty. However 
that may be, Joseph's brethren appeared before the king, 
and repeated their catechism very well. 

"And Pharaoh spake unto Joseph, saying, Thy father and thy brethren 
are come unto thee; the land of Egypt is before thee; in the best of the 
land make thy father and brethren to dwell; in the land of Goshen let 
them dwell; and if thou knowest any men of activity among them, then 
make them rulers over my cattle." 

Now comes one of the most unique and charming 
scenes, I think, in this pastoral history — the meeting be- 
tween the king of Egypt and the wandering old sheik of 
the desert — Pharoah and Jacob. 

" And Joseph brought in Jacob his father, and set him before Pharaoh 
and Jacob blessed Pharaoh." 

He did not wait for the king's benediction. Ripe old 
man — for he was ripe. When he beheld this monarch in 
his regal splendor, which must have dazzled the eyes, one 
would think, of a man who had lived in tents and dwelt 
in a wilderness all his life, when Jacob was brought be- 
fore the proudest monarch on the globe, he blessed him. 
There was dignity and pride for you ! Without pretense, 
there was the rising of a man into his true position of 
superiority, by his benediction. So he set Pharaoh down 
in his proper place. 

" And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art thou ? And Jacob said 
unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and 
thirty years; few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, and 



JOSEPH. 149 

have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the 
days of their pilgrimage. And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out from 
before Pharaoh." 

That needs nothing more. 

The next scene is that in which Jacob blesses the chil- 
dren of Joseph, and adopts them into the tribal relation. 
There was no tribe of Joseph. There were two half-tribes, 
of Ephraim and Manasseh. These were the two sons born 
to Joseph while he dwelt in Egypt. 

"And it came to pass after these things [you are to bear in mind that 
Joseph was a grand official of Egypt], that one told Joseph, Behold, thy 
father is sick : and he took with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. 
And one told Jacob, and said. Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee : 
and Israel strengthened himself [summoned up the whole of his energy in 
his weak state], and sat upon the bed [probably upon the edge of the bed]. 
And Jacob said unto Joseph [this was a retrospect of his life], God Almighty 
appeared unto me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me ; and said 
unto me. Behold, I will make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, and I will 
make of thee a multitude of people ; and will give this land to thy seed 
after thee for an everlasting possession. And now thy two sons, Ephraim 
and Manasseh, which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I 
came unto thee into Egypt, are mine ; as Reuben and Simeon, they shall be 
mine. And thy issue, which thou begettest after them, shall be thine, and 
shall be called after the name of their brethren in their inheritance. And 
as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me in the land of 
Canaan in the way, when yet there was but a little way to come unto Eph- 
rath : and I buried her there in the way of Ephrath ; the same is Beth-lehem." 

There is something indescribably touching in the retro- 
spect this old patriarch gives of his whole life. There 
were but two things that stood up in it, apparently. He 
had had a great experience both at home and at Padan- 
aram, and he had been for a long time an honored chief 
among the neighboring nations ; but only two things 
seemed to remain to him worth remembering. One was, 
that God had appeared to him and filled his soul with a 
sense of divine presence, and promised him great blessings 
in his posterity ; and the other was Rachel. These were 
the two great controlling facts of his life — God and Love. 
He was talking to Joseph, who was Rachel's first-born, long- 
delayed child, and he was overwhelmed with emotion. 

"And Israel beheld Joseph's sons, and said. Who are these ? And Joseph 



I50 BIBLE STUDIES. 

said unto his father, They are my sons, whom God hath given me in this 
place. And he said, Bring them, I pray thee, unto me, and I will bless 
them. Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age, so that he could not see. 
And he brought them near unto him ; and he kissed them, and embraced 
them. And Israel said unto Joseph, I had not thought to see thy face : and, 
lo, God hath showed me also thy seed. And Joseph brought them out from 
between his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth. And 
Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel's left 
hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel's right hand, and brought 
them near unto him." 

That was the order of their birth ; and the blessings of 
primogeniture were bestowed on the eldest. 

Now, you recollect that Esau was first born and Jacob 
was second, and you remember the disgraceful trick by 
which Jacob superseded his brother, and became heir 
apparent, and inherited the blessings of his father Isaac. 
So when his son Joseph brought his boys, and they were in 
an attitude such that, in blessing, the right hand, that 
always carries the idea of power and prominence, should 
fall upon the first born, Jacob said nothing^but crossed his 
hands, and put his right hand on the second born, and his 
left hand on the first born. Through the old man's mind 
what a curious thread of thought and feeling must have 
run, that he should have done that ! 

"And he blessed Joseph, and said, God, before whom my fathers Abra- 
ham and Isaac did walk, the God which fed me all my life long unto this 
day, the Angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads ; and let my 
name be named on them, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac ; 
and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth. And when 
Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand upon the head of Ephraim, 
it displeased him : and he held up his father's hand, to remove" it from 
Ephraim's head unto Manasseh's head. And Joseph said unto his father, 
Not so, my father : for this is the firstborn ; put thy right hand upon his 
head. And his father refused, and said, I know it, my son, I know it : he 
also shall become a people, and he also shall be great : but truly his younger 
brother shall be greater than he, and his seed shall become a multitude of 
nations. 

"And he blessed them that day, saying, In thee shall Israel bless, say- 
ing, God make thee as Ephraim and as Manasseh : and he set Ephraim 
before Manasseh. 

"And Israel said unto Joseph, Behold, I die : but God shall be with you, 
and bring you again unto the land of your fathers. Moreover I have given 



JOSEPH. I Sir 

to thee one portion above thy brethren, which I took out of the hand of the 
Amorite with my sword and with my bow." 

This inextinguishable love of the old patriarch was the 
crowning feature of his character. 

Then comes the scene of the prophecy and blessing 
which Jacob bestows upon his twelve sons. I shall not 
go through this in detail ; or, rather, I shall rapidly run 
through it, without giving all the explanations that are 
recorded, because I propose by and by to take the parallel 
scene of the blessings which Moses uttered in like condi- 
tions. It will be a matter of interest to see what was the 
blessing of Jacob upon the twelve sons, and what the bless- 
ing of Moses upon the twelve tribes ; and under those 
conditions we shall recur to it. I will, however, give a few 
passages from the record on this point. It is a poem. On 
that account it has been objected to. It is said that folks 
do not make poems when they are dying. My reply to 
that is, that they never make them so well at any other 
time as then. It is said that this was a prophecy made 
after the event. It may have been, but there is no evidence 
that there was a necessity for any such strange procedure. 
I never admit a miracle if I can help it ; and I never refuse 
to admit one if I cannot help it. I believe in miracles and 
in prophecies ; and yet I do not believe that everything 
wonderful is a miracle ; nor do I believe that everything 
said to be a prophecy is a foretelling. 

"And Jacob called unto his sons, and said. Gather yourselves together, 
that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days. Gather 
yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob ; and hearken unto Israel 
your father." 

It is almost the voice of a bard, and not that of a feeble 
old man. Are you not familiar with the fact that often, 
when persons are dying, the w^hole force of their being 
goes to the head, so that they manifest transcendent powers 
in that hour ? I know not why at such times men may not 
be prophets and seers of visions. When in the dying hour 
men think they behold father and mother and children 
waiting for them across the border, I know no reason why 



152 BIBLE STUDIES. 

we should not believe that they see them. There is some- 
thing sublime in the rising of this old man out of infirmity 
and almost imbecility in the last moment of his earthly life 
to pronounce these final utterances. 

" Reuben, thou art my firstborn, my might, and the beginning [or first 
fruits] of my strength, the excellency of dignity, and the excellency of 
power : unstable as water, thou shalt not excel." 

Effervescent as boiling or bubbling water would be a better 
rendering. It is as if he said, Thy passions boil up, like 
water over a fire. " Thou shalt not excel," would be better 
rendered, Thou shalt not have priority or preference. By rea- 
son of Reuben's transgression Jacob would not make him 
first, although he was his oldest son. 

" Simeon and Levi are brethren." 

Of course they were ; but he meant in a disgraceful 
sense. 

" Instruments of cruelty are in their habitations. O my soul, come not 
thou into their secret ; unto their assembly, mine honor, be not thou united : 
for in their anger they slew a man [men], and in their selfwill they digged 
down a wall." 

You recollect the history of the Shechemites. You re- 
member how these brothers, by stratagem, acted by way 
of revenge for the wrong done their sister, destroying the 
whole male population of this people, driving off their cat- 
tle, and committing other depredations. 

"Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was 
cruel : I will divide them in Jacob, and scatter them in Israel." 

It came to pass that for the tribes of Simeon and Levi 
no territorial limits were appointed, but that they had 
assigned to them certain cities within the territory of other 
sons. The tribe of Levi was regarded as the tribe from 
which the priesthood came ; and if 1 were disposed to 
spiritualize, as almost all ministers do, finding types and 
prototypes in the Sacred Scriptures, I should say the fight- 
ing qualities of theology in after times came from the tribe 
of Levi, who was a cruel and belligerent ancestor from the 
beginning. 



JOSEPH. 1 53 

" Judah, thou art he whom thy brethren shall praise : thy hand shall be 
in the neck of thine enemies ; thy father's children shall bow down before 
thee. Judah is a lion's whelp : from the prey, my son, thou art gone up : 
he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion ; who shall rouse 
him up ? The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from 
betvyeen his feet, until Shiloh come ; and unto him shall the gathering of 
the people be." 

Yoja will recall that when the tribes went off to Babylon 
and were dispersed and lost, it was Judah that maintained 
his individual tribal existence ; that temples were multi- 
plied, and the continuity of religious feeling was with his 
tribe. 

So Jacob goes on until he comes to Joseph, and then the 
old man's heart breaks out again with a freshet. 

"Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose 
branches run over the wall : the archers have sorely grieved him, and shot 
at him, and hated him : but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his 
hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob ; (from 
thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel :) even by the God of thy father, 
who shall help thee ; and by the Almighty, who shall bless thee with bless- 
ings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lieth under, blessings of 
the breasts, and of the womb : the blessings of thy father have prevailed 
above the blessings of my progenitors unto the utmost bound of the ever- 
lasting hills : they shall be on the head of Joseph [for Joseph was Rachel's 
son], and on the crown of the head of him that was separate from his breth- 
ren." 

And it is said : — 

" When Jacob had made an end of commanding his sons, he gathered up 
his feet into the bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his 
people. And Joseph fell upon his father's face, and wept upon him, and 
kissed him. And Joseph commanded his servants the physicians to embalm 
his father : and the physicians embalmed Israel." 

He was embalmed after the manner of the Egyptians. 

Then Joseph goes in to Pharaoh, and asks leave of 
absence to go up and bury his father, with Abraham and 
Isaac, in the cave of Machpelah. Permission is granted, 
and all the servants of Pharaoh, the principal officers of his 
household, the elders of the land of Egypt, and all the 
house of Joseph and his brethren, and his father's house 
except their little ones, their flocks, and their herds, which 



154 - BIBLE STUDIES. 

they left in the land of Goshen, went to make up the 
funeral procession. 

"And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen : and it was a 
very great company. And they came to the tlireshingfloor of Atad, which 
is beyond Jordan. And there they mourned with a great and very sore 
lamentation : and he made a mourning for his father seven days." 

That is to say, they gathered together, and went through 
ceremonies expressive of grief. There were appointed 
mourners who chanted funeral songs and uttered exclama- 
tions of sorrow. It was thought to be necessary to have a 
band of hired mourners at funerals in those times, as it is 
thought in our day that bereaved persons should robe them- 
selves in garments that have been woven in the loom of 
midnight. 

"And when the inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites, saw the mourn- 
ing in the floor of Atad, they said, This is a grievous mourning to the 
Egyptians : wherefore the name of it was called Abel-mizraim." 

Mizi^aim is the name of Egypt ; and it is called the mourn- 
ing of the Egyptians. 

When Joseph had returned from burying his father, and 
before his own death, his brethren, with the same sordidness 
which they had manifested all their life, counseled, " Now 
that Joseph's father is dead nothing will restrain him, and 
he will turn upon us ; " and they humbled themselves,and 
sent a deputation to him, with a lie, undoubtedly, saying ; — 

" So shall ye say unto Joseph, Forgive, I pray thee now, the trespass of 
thy brethren, and their sin ; for they did unto thee evil : and now, we pray 
thee, forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of thy father. 

"And Joseph [who was a great and generous soul] wept when they spake 
unto him. And his brethren also went and fell down before his face ; and 
they said, Behold, we be thy servants. And Joseph said unto them, Fear 
not : for am I in the place of God ? But as for you, ye thought evil against 
me ; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save 
much people alive. Now therefore fear ye not : I will nourish you, and 
your little ones." 

That is, all his regal power was for their benefit. 
Then came the time of his own dying. He said to his 
brethren : — 

" I die : and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land 



JOSEPH. 155 

unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. And 
Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit 
you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence. So Joseph died, being 
an hundred and ten years old : and they embalmed him, and he was put in 
a coffin in Egypt." 

■What matters it to a man where he is when he is dead ? 
What if one's body has been devoted to the surgeon's knife ; 
or plunged in the depths of the sea ; or has perished by 
the flame ? No knife, no flame, touches the real man. The 
body is but the casket in which the jewel lies. And yet, 
to one that has a thought of the beautiful, how romantic — 
shall I say poetic ? — how intensely natural, it was that 
Joseph should have longed to be buried by the side of his 
fathers — that, on account of the glory of the kingdom yet 
to be raised, which he saw, vaguely perhaps, he should 
have yearned to be with his ancestors ! 

I had always supposed that when my father had become 
old and feeble, he would desire to be buried in old Litch- 
field ; but no ; after he became so infirm that he was no 
longer able to remember words with which to convey what 
his wishes were, by signs and tokens he said to me, "Bury 
me by the side of that dear man " (he could not utter the 
name), — Dr. Nathaniel Taylor, of New Haven, as noble a 
man as God ever made, and whose heart was knitted to my 
father's heart, and his to his, with cords that death could 
not sunder. My father wanted to be buried by his side, if, 
peradventure, in the morning of the resurrection, when 
they rose together, they might, with equal wing-beat, fly, 
at the first dawn, and greet the smile of the Father's face. 

Few are they that have this feeling. Unhappy am I, that 
have not a bit of it. 

I have now gone through the book of Genesis : not by 
any means considering all the details that are of profound 
interest in it, but only giving a cursory view with reference 
to the general contents. It is a book of literature. If you 
accept it as literature it is a book full of benefit and of 
comfort ; but if you undertake to make the book of Genesis 
authoritative and mandatory on belief and conduct you 



156 BIBLE STUDIES. 

come wide of that benefit and that comfort. No man can 
unite it harmoniously with the later revelations of the 
truth in Christ Jesus ; and no man jcan attempt to make 
every part of it harmonize with later known facts with- 
out demoralizing and injuring himself theologicall)^ It 
is impertinence to take the utterances and experiences 
of a child five years old and apply them to a man fifty 
years old ; and it is no less an impertinence to make the 
needs of nascent tribes a criterion by which to judge of 
the necessities of men who have arrived at full-grown man- 
hood in the Lord Jesus Christ. As literature, the history 
of the early developments of the race is invaluable, but as 
dogma it is useless. 

As I have said, the record of Beginnings may be divided 
into several periods. One is the nebulous stage, which 
treats of creation. After that comes the destruction, by 
the flood, of the human race. Then follows a very brief 
history of the descendants of Noah — especially that partic- 
ular line which includes the primitive patriarchs, Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob. The last half, or perhaps two-thirds, is 
occupied in tracing the experiences of these patriarchs. 
They have produced upon the imagination of the Israelites, 
and upon the imagination of modern Christians, an impres- 
sion that is illusory ; and I propose, in the remainder of 
the evening, to give a glance at the actual condition and 
relations of these men. 

In the first place, as I said in an earlier discourse of this 
series, the patriarchs were not the founders of the organ- 
ized Jewish nation. They founded nothing. They had no 
theology. They had no formulated worship. They had 
no recognized laws. They had no government. The head 
of the family was the chief and the priest, and did that 
which according to his fathers' customs was supposed to 
be right. There were no religious institutions — no places 
of worship. They founded none, except here and there, for 
specific reasons, an altar, — as few in the time of Isaac as in 
the time of Abraham ; and as few in the time of Jacob as 
in the time of Isaac or Abraham. And there was no prog- 



JOSETJl. 157 

ress made between the time of Jacob and the time of Jo- 
seph, when Jacob died in Egypt. 

There is a sense in which these patriarchs stand at the 
head. A little rill in the mountains flows down and be- 
comes the Amazon ; but the Amazon is formed, not by 
that rill, but by the hundred side-streams that pour in„ 
And yet, the Amazon is said to have had its origin in that 
little rill, no bigger than my finger. 

In that sense the tribes had their origin in the old patri- 
archs ; but when we follow them out, after they had lived 
two or three hundred years, there were only about seventy 
that went down into Egypt and took up their residence in 
the land of Goshen. 

We must be very cautious, too, in attributing to them 
such intercourse w^ith the divine Being as it is claimed in 
general religious literature that they had. It is not neces- 
sary to deny that they had conscious intercourse with God 
— I believe everyone has that who experiences any disclos- 
ure of moral sense ; but there is no evidence that they had it 
in any such sense as it is ordinarily held that they had. In 
the magnified and exaggerated impressions of both modern 
and ancient times, I see no evidence of such intercourse. 
Because a man dreams that he talks with God, and that 
God directs him to do so and so, it does not follow that 
that is the teaching of God. The real and discernible per- 
sonal relations between these men and God were occasional. 
They were not manifested by a steady stream of influence. 
They were often only in the form of dreams or impressions 
on the imagination. In a sense that raised them out of 
the sphere of natural causes, and indicated that they had 
direct personal intercourse with God, or that they experi- 
enced the operation of the divine mind on theirs, there 
were but two or three instances. Nothing that they ever 
did was above the ordinary moderate use of the common 
faculties. Their whole history unfolded itself naturally. 
Human nature in them had not risen to any great height. 
Their knowledge was very limited. Their idea of God — 
how^ extensive was it ? They believed in one God ; but 



158 BIBLE STUDIES. 

how much was that one God, as they thought of him? 
What did they think of him ? To Abraham he w*as '^ the 
Highest " of all the gods he knew of — the Supreme One — 
the only real one ; to the later patriarchs, he was the God 
of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 

And what did God teach these men on the subject of 
veracity, and the indispensable necessity of it ? There is 
no record on this point. There is no command which 
makes truth obligatory, nor is there any rebuke of its vio- 
lation. There was a principle of honesty and integrity — 
a kind of varying, unstable principle on which men acted. 
This exists in every nation on the globe ; society could not 
cohere without it : but that they had anything more in this 
direction than every tribe on earth has there is no trace. 
What teaching was given them in regard to polygamy— 
that vile cancer on the household ? What were they taught 
of that great love which is the exaltation of human nature 
— the sacred love that exists between one and another? Is 
it conceivable that in the course of three lives, for nearly 
three hundred years, while men were supposed to be in 
intercourse with God, God should have had nothing to im- 
part to. his people on the subject of polygamy ? However 
that may be, this evil was suffered to exist and to bear its 
evil results without rebuke, so far as the Old Testament 
Scriptures tell us. There was no preconception of the 
proper status of the household. What steps were taken 
toward civilization in this and other particulars were taken 
after their time. They remained shepherds till the very 
last. They had no laws, institutions, customs, or organized 
methods, that we should not criticise very severely. 

This will appear more plain when we compare the con- 
dition of Israel on coming into Egypt with Egypt itself. 
Egypt was the one civilized nation on the globe when the 
patriarchs were thrown within her borders. It was a 
regularly organized government. It was not the best gov- 
ernment that, in the light of experiments which men have 
since made, it was possible to have ; but it was a better 
government than any contemporaneous nation had, and 



JOSEPIL 1 59 

certainly better than these wandering tribes had. It was a 
stable government. It had a settled order of procedure. It 
embraced a set of wholesome laws. The Egyptians were 
an agricultural people. They led, as it were, the nations 
of the earth. They had also an active commerce ; and 
agriculture and commerce go hand in hand. The agri- 
culture and the commerce w^ere not of the highest type, 
but they were very important, and it took centuries to 
compass their development. They had made some ad- 
vance in art ; their sculpture was above that of other 
nations and their architecture most impressive. In con- 
structive engineering they were pre-eminent. Modern en- 
gineers even contemplate with admiration the wonderful 
feats they accomplished with but few and inferior tools. 
Gunpowder and nitro-glycerine were unknown ; and yet 
the achievements of quarrying that were performed with 
poor instruments, we, with all our machinery and steam 
power, regard with astonishment. Think of carving the 
Sphinx out of a single rock ! Look at the stones selected, 
from many quarries, for the pyramids, with a wisdom 
which would do credit to engineers of modern scientific 
experience. And consider the moving of these stones — for 
it is said that the methods of doing this were almost as 
marvelous as the pyramids themselves. And there was 
also a vast complicated institutional organization of relig- 
ion, with some notable elements that may well excite our 
admiration. Here was a nation that had come up and de- 
veloped to a remarkable degree, compared with which the 
other nations w^ere as shavings alongside of magnificent 
trees of the forest. 

And yet Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob made a profound 
impression on the imagination of the later Jewish nation. 
The Jews half created these Fathers of the primitive period. 
They clothed them with the luminous robes which they 
have worn. When they pronounced the names "Abraham," 
'' Isaac," and "Jacob," they did not see those men as they 
were : they saw them as the heroes they had made them to 
be — what to the Greeks Hercules was. The patriarchs 



l6o BIBLE STUDIES. 

meant to them what the primitive heroes of almost every 
nation naturally mean ; they were glorified by their origin- 
ators. 

And this estimation of the three great patriarchs has 
run through Christian literature perhaps even more than 
through the literature of the Jews. Jacob, the least Christ- 
like, the least spiritual, of them, the man that had the 
shrewdest sense of property and good management, the 
politician and statesman, is sometimes extolled to a degree 
that borders on blasphemy. I have heard prayers com- 
menced by references to him which mxade me shiver. To 
the Jews it w^as a common thing to say, " The God of 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," or "The God of our fathers," 
thus exalting these men above all other human beings. 
To us, what are Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob but dim lights 
on the remotest horizon of antiquity ? And when you 
come to closely examine them as to their manhood, religion, 
and spirituality, they will not bear the searching inquisi- 
tion of the rules of our modern religious knowledge and 
feeling. 

But it will be said, "How is it that the New Testament 
speaks of them as it^does?" You will find that in the 
twelfth chapter of Hebrews it is shown that Abraham was 
regarded as having poetic thoughts, that he acted with 
reference to things which he could not see, things which 
he expected in the future, things in the air. So did Isaac 
and Jacob have thoughts of things which had not taken 
place, but which were to take place in the future, illustrat- 
ing the power of men through faith in the invisible to act 
outside of the sensuous. That was a vast gain upon the 
low, material condition of men of their day. The New 
Testament speaks of them as they were estimated. 

It is said that Christ spoke of them reverentially. That 
is true. He spoke of them as ancestors, as their descend- 
ants were accustomed to speak of them. But one recorded 
fact is striking : that when the very summit of his own life 
was reached, before his crucifixion, at the Transfiguration 
upon the side of the mountain^ it was not Abraham nor 



JOSEPH. i6i 

Isaac nor Jacob that came over, and in the air were spec- 
tators. It was Moses and Elijah that appeared and talked 
with him. It was Moses who was the founder of the 
Israelites, in any proper sense of that term ; their institu- 
tions were derived from the hand of Moses ; while their 
moral instructions came from the prophets, from the time 
of Samuel down to the end of the long line. 

There were, however, three great elements which oper- 
ated upon these ancient men, and which were transmitted 
from them to their posterity. First, and most important, 
there was firm and unwavering faith in the unity of God 
as distinguished from the polytheism of idolatry. While 
in other nations almost every natural phenomenon was 
supposed to be a god, it was borne in upon the mind of 
Abraham, and transmitted by him to his children, that 
there was but one God, and that besides him all objects or 
creatures that were claimed to be gods were idols and lies. 
The patriarchs held that there was one supreme Creator, 
Governor, Judge, God ; and that truth has been trans- 
mitted by their whole posterity. 

What if they did not meditate largely upon the attributes 
of God ? What if they did not apprehend the elements of 
moral government ? What if, in that early, twilight age, 
no religious institutions had yet been evolved ? Here was 
the very center of all true religion — one God ; and in that 
dark, desolate period, these men stood unwavering wit- 
nesses to that truth. 

Then, next, was the purity of the household. When I 
hear men say that the life of the world has been wrapped 
UD in its system of religious doctrine, my reply is that in 
connection with that, as one of the saving influences of 
mankind, has been the foundation of the family upon 
purity of life. The household is one ark that has gone far 
toward carrying nascent peoples and individuals over the 
perils of dark periods to safety ; and the patriarchs, Abra- 
ham, Isaac, and Jacob, held their tribes together by the 
pure household, making the family an ark of purity and 
safety. 



1 62 BIBLE STUDIES. 

There was one more element in their lives that should be 
mentioned in this enumeration — namely, their hope in a 
future, although this hope never amounted to a firm faith. 
They did not go through the world with their heads down 
like browsing cattle ; their thoughts were directed upward, 
to a land beyond, where they and their posterity were to 
dwell after leaving this mortal sphere. 

These : One God, the Household intact and pure, and the 
Hope of a Futuf^e, were the three great elements that were 
developing in the patriarchal period. Though they had 
not then attained the degree of perfection which they have 
reached in modern times, they were rooted and grounded. 
And when we consider that they were, so to speak, the 
mere letters of the alphabet ; when we consider that from 
these primal elements have been unfolded all the glory of 
later Christian civilization, we cannot but acknowledge 
their vast importance to the race, and derive from them a 
large conception of the methods of God in guiding his 
people from a low state to a higher. 

I accept, then, this Book of Beginnings as fehe recorded 
history of the first faint dawnings of that life which has 
now become so wondrous in its development. I am grateful 
for the preservation of these records. I value them for the 
treasures I find in them. They are rich in sweet pictures, 
admirable touches of nature, which no man would will- 
ingly miss. Here were a people that were said to have been 
led of God ; and I believe they were. I think he led them 
by natural laws — by evolution of their social and moral 
natures. The book of Genesis shows us the selection of 
the crude elements ; their development and refinement 
must be seen in later records. 



IX. 

MOSES. 



In pursuing our course of readings from the Old Testa- 
ment Scriptures, we have completed the first book — the 
book of the beginnings or origins of things. We leave 
it with regret. It is a book of delight. It is a book in 
which the stories take on all romantic forms. It is the book 
of the infancy of the human race. The pastoral life and 
histories are poems, and we have taken great pleasure in 
them. 

Now we pass on to the second book, with which definite 
history begins. We come down to times more nearly 
within our reach, more nearly within the domain of those 
instruments of thought by which men have learned to 
compass and record the truth. 

This book is called Exodus^ from its Greek name in the 
Septuagint. The Septuagint is the oldest Greek version 
of the Old Testament in existence. It was made, proba- 
bly in the third century before Christ, for those who were 
dispersed abroad, and who spoke, principally, the Greek 
language, and it was the version commonly used by the 
Jews in the time of Christ, even in Palestine. In English, 
the book of Exodus may be called The Book of the Going 
Forth^ or the Departure. It is divided, naturally, into two 
parts : the first nineteen chapters giving, mainly, the his- 
tory of the departure of the Israelites from Egypt ; and 
from the nineteenth chapter to the end, offering delinea- 
tions of those institutions, civil and religious, which Moses 
gave to his people. 



Sunday evening, December 22, 1878. Lessun : Psa. cvi. 



1 64 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Of course it is for me, to-night, only to make a begin- 
ning upon this great history ; and in doing this I must call 
your attention to the relation which men of ancient thought 
sustained to the element of time. It might almost be said 
that in the records of the Old Testament, certainly in its 
primary, primitive books, the element of time was not 
thought of. I should almost say that the idea of chronology 
in a literary record had not, in that early day, been in- 
vented in such a sense as that in which we use the term. 

For example, simply from the book of Genesis who 
could tell what the time-element was in that era ? Who, 
merely from the Old Testament history, standing between 
the first Creation and the next natural period, the Flood, 
could determine the number of years that elapsed ? There 
is no determination of the time-element at all, nor any 
attempt at it, in the Old Testament ; the literary efforts 
made to determine this element have been made upon 
hints and incidental facts ; and they have never been very 
successful. From the Flood to the time of Abraham — cer- 
tainly hundreds of years — there is perfect silence on the 
subject in the record. From the call of Abraham to the 
death of Jacob in Egypt, during the patriarchal period, 
which is supposed to have extended through about two 
hundred and fifteen years, there is nothing in the narra- 
tive upon which a conclusion could be based. Things are 
not stated definitely, except as regards the ages of men. 
For the most part they are given ; and even they are un- 
certain as to whether referring to men or tribes ; and, for 
the most part, from those data we are obliged to make our 
own calculations as to the lapse of time. 

Then from the descent into Egypt to the period of Moses, 
which we are told in the New Testament was about four 
hundred and seventy years, there is nothing in the older 
record that gives any idea of the length of the period. It 
was a timeless history. There appears in this, as in many 
other things, the impress of an infant race, an infant un- 
folding, an infant literature. Everything was nascent, 
undeveloped. And this carries with it a strong impression 



MOSES. 165 

as to the reality and authenticity of these ancient scrip- 
tures. They are as old as men have thought them to be. 
They are not modern inventions. They bear upon their 
very face, in their very 'deficiencies and in their aberra- 
tions, the marks of antiquity. They existed before civiliza- 
tion and literature and learning were born into the world. 
If they had come down to us dressed as perfectly as our 
own histories are, we should at once have said, '' These 
cannot be the histories of primitive races." The very 
antiquity of these scriptures is borne out by their inciden- 
tal deficiencies. 

This time-element is very striking when you consider it 
in its relations to the exactitude of the divine administra- 
tion in the natural world. Look at the great sphere of 
astronomy, where everything moves according to accurate 
mathematical exactness and definiteness ; there are no 
variations or exceptions : everything is positive. Look 
at the strict accuracy of proportions in chemistry, where 
all is definite, constant, always and everywhere. In phys- 
ics the relations are invariably clear, and true to the ascer- 
tainable laws of cause and effect, structure and function. 
In contrast with the accuracy which exists in outward 
nature, striking is the lack, in this primitive record, of 
exactitude and definiteness in the processes of human 
action. It is as if the thoughts of men rose as clouds rise 
that take on vague forms — indeterminate shapes ; and we 
see in the primitive history traces of this vagueness of 
thought strangely pervading the records themselves. 

In connection with this lack of definiteness and exacti- 
tude as regards the time-element, we are to-night brought 
to the very edge of a gulf. More than four hundred years 
lie before us, between Joseph and Moses. Out of that 
period comes not a single voice. There is no evidence, in 
the Scriptures or elsewhere, so far as the Israelites were 
concerned, that there was an altar or tabernacle built. 
The indications are that those four hundred years were 
years of darkness, silence, mystery. We can penetrate it 
by using known laws, and by inference ; but the record is 



1 66 BIBLE STUDIES. 

dead. The sixth and seventh verses of the first chapter 
of Exodus are separated by four hundred years, without 
hint or sign. 

"And Joseph died, and all his brethren, and all that generation. 

"And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and 
multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with 
them." 

This covered a period of four hundred years ; and there 
is no record of the great space of time between. If we wish 
any memorial of it we must take the reflection, as it were, 
of backward beams of light. We have the history of the 
Israelites when they came out of Egypt ; and as every 
effect must have a cause, taking the effects which were 
wrought out in four hundred years, we can come to 
some knowledge of the causes which must have been in 
existence during the time. 

The question may arise as to whether these people were 
not under divine care during that period. We have seen 
that the Old Testament claims that Abraham was espe- 
cially called of God, and was under his personal super- 
vision and tutelage, that Isaac followed in the same line 
of divine convoy, and that Jacob was conducted from 
period to period under the constant inspection and guid- 
ance of God : but here spring up twelve heads of Tribes 
that cover four hundred years in which there is apparently 
no convoy, no declarative providence over them. 

God employs nature. Nature is greater than institu- 
tions. It is the parent of institutions. All righteous insti- 
tutions are but nature applied. God's communications to 
men by the living voice are not so solemn nor so sublime 
as the communications of God to men through the voices 
of nature round about us. Israel was not forgotten or 
abandoned because in the wisdom of divine providence 
she was left to vegetate, to become a people, and so to 
prepare for us a great after-history. This long period was 
required to develop a nation in numbers. At any rate, it 
may be said that one thing which did happen during those 
four hundred 3^ears was a mighty increase in the numbers 



MOSES. 167 

of the nation. Could not that have been done in Pales- 
tine ? It is very doubtful. It is more than likely, when 
you consider the preoccupation of the territory b)^ warlike 
tribes on every side, that the posterity of Abraham and his 
descendants would have drifted north or east or south, and 
remained in a nomadic or pastoral life. Now a pastoral 
life scatters : an agricultural life condenses. The Israelites 
were carried to a condition in which they would be held 
together, and be able to keep all that they gathered, and 
to maintain a cohesive existence. Seventy souls went 
down into Egypt. It is the general opinion (though the 
estimates vary from a million to a million and a half, and 
even tw^o millions), that a million souls came out of Egypt. 
Here, then, was the nest ; and this was the brood ! 

The region inhabited by them was fitted, by its position, 
and by other circumstances, to the transition from pas- 
toral to agricultural life. It was east of the easternmost 
branch of the Nile. It was within agricultural bounds. 
It included pastoral lands. So, about the patriarchs in 
Goshen, where they settled down and grew up, there was 
a land that had both agricultural and pastoral adaptations, 
with a constant tendency to pass from the pastoral to the 
agricultural, which is the next higher step in development ; 
this had a civilizing effect. While it had its repugnances, 
it also had certain elevating influences which it exerted 
upon this nascent people. That they became to a very 
great extent agricultural, we know ; and that the nomadic 
element was in them, we know. They never eradicated 
that. This is shown by the fact that Moses took a million 
of them and carried them into the wilderness, and for forty 
years convoyed them there. It would be impossible to 
take a settled nation and carry them into such a nomadic 
life. The possibility of their being induced to lead a wan- 
dering life was based upon the old instinct in them of the 
shepherd life. So, then, they had an addiction toward the 
agricultural without losing the pastoral. 

Thus the Israelites were placed in this Goshen land, first 
because it fitted their pastoral life, and second because it 



1 68 BIBLE STUDIES. 

afforded facilities for agricultural pursuits. It so happened 
that this was an important frontier of Egypt ; that it was 
the weak side of that country, as toward the great Asiatic 
nations, which had overrun and were overrunning the 
Egyptian territory. Egypt did not need to guard itself on 
the west or on the south ; for, although it had once been 
assailed and overrun from the interior of Africa, the likeli- 
hood of attack was not in that direction. The warlike 
people of Asia rose and multiplied, and threatened to roll 
over to the great valley of the Nile, that was the attraction 
of the universal world, on account of its wealth, of the 
glory of its art, and of the reputation of its monarchs. 

Now, as I have said, the frontier was Goshen ; and the 
Israelites were a plucky people. They never ceased to be 
such. Abraham did not fight in vain. He showed that he 
was a warrior. Not so with Isaac. He was quiescent. He 
was an everlasting member of the Peace Society. Jacob 
was politic. He was not, at the last resort, I suppose, un- 
willing to contend, but he lived by a diligent exercise of 
his brains in all matters that came to him. But the pos- 
terity of these three men showed that they had vigor, bone, 
muscle, irascibility, courage, cruelty, and capacity for ven^ 
geance. They were primitive warriors. It was nothing 
for them to destroy a city in order to satisfy their turbu- 
lence, their passion, their ungovernableness, the bad quali- 
ties in them. And when their posterity or their country 
was threatened, they were plucky and could be depended 
upon for defense. So, these Israelites, being put in Goshen 
to defend the frontier, were trained to a kind of semi-mili- 
tary feeling. It was shown when they first went into the 
wilderness. If brought to emergencies they were capable 
of meeting and overwhelming their adversaries. They 
were warlike ; and the inner source of their power was the 
fact that they were being instructed in the art of war. In 
the history of the world, military training is for civilization 
next to moral training. That is to say, physical vigor, 
strength, and courage are indispensable to virtue and to 
power. Weakness in a nation is an unforgivable heresy. 



MOSES. 169 

Strength is the element of permanence. Weakness fore- 
tokens decay. In civiUzing a nation the elements of 
courage and enterprise are blessed evidences of a condition 
which will take on polish. You cannot polish a pumpkin, 
nor lead. The things that are hard, and will hold polish, 
dre the things that we burnish and brighten. There must 
be a great deal of human nature if you are going to make 
much grace out of it ; — and there was a great deal of 
human nature among the Israelites. 

Then, their position and family clannishness led them to 
keep aloof from the great body of the Egyptians. They 
did not mingle with them. I have no doubt that the 
Egyptians despised the Israelites, and I have no doubt 
that the Israelites paid them back in the same coin. 
While repugnances and prejudices that separate men in 
our day generally are not to be praised,' but are to be dis- 
allowed, there are circumstances in which they are to the 
last degree desirable. It was so with the Israelites ; and 
being placed in this valley of bounty, which produced 
everything that flourished in the tropics, they gradually 
separated themselves to a greater or less extent from the 
Egyptians. There is no other wall like hatred. At any 
rate, they did not deliquesce readily and mingle with the 
common people of that nation. 

It is true that they were infected, to a certain degree, 
with Egyptian idolatry ; and yet, in other things they were 
not affected at all by their contact with the Egyptians. 
They are spoken of in the historical record as having 
served the gods in Egypt. The great object of worship in 
Egypt was the sun. In all Oriental nations the sun and 
stars produced a most powerful impression upon the 
imagination — a sense of veneration. In Egypt the worship 
of the sun stood as in Palestine did the worship of Jehovah, 
the Everlasting, the Everliving. And they worshiped not 
only the sun but all the other powers of nature, with their 
hundreds of symbols in the celestial bodies and in vege- 
table and animal forms. 

Thus the Israelitish people dwelt ; and, though \v^ have 



I70 BIBLE STUDIES. 

no record or actual knowledge of their condition when they 
went out of Egypt, yet those four hundred years must have 
been years of vegetation, and of gradual unfolding, grad- 
ual strengthening, gradual preparation for the great drama 
in which this peculiar people were to act so sublime a 
part. 

During this whole time, as I have said, there was no 
hero, no great priest, no towering patriarch. Four hun- 
dred years were waiting for the coming man ; and when 
he came he was a man who, in proportions and in grand- 
eur, was worthy of that long waiting. For until you come 
to the Advent there is no name in all human history that, 
for various excellence, can be compared for one single 
moment with the name of Moses, the man who, as a leader, 
so excelled as to gain a reputation unexampled — the man 
who delivered his people, not only, but whose leadership 
itself paled in the superior light of his power of organiza- 
tion and of administration. The foundations on which 
commonwealths are built to-da}^ were laid in the Arabian 
desert ; and the laws and customs and institutions which 
we cherish in our time with most tenacity, and for good 
reason, came originally from the hand of Moses, than 
whom nature has never produce greater man. 

I shall not, to-night, attempt to discuss at all the dis- 
puted question of the real historical existence of one called 
Moses., and the genuineness of his labor. I do not sympa- 
thize with the extreme school that undertake to destroy all 
history, and to resolve everything into the nebulae of 
remote antiquity. It seems to me to require a greater 
stretch of faith and more breadth of conception to suppose 
a character like Moses to have been invented than to sup- 
pose that he lived and performed the tasks that are 
ascribed to him. At another time I shall consider, in 
brief, the subject of the reality of Moses, and the substan- 
tial historic foundation of the history that is given of him. 

With these preliminary remarks I turn to the first two 
chapters of the book of Exodus. 

"And Joseph died, and all his brethren, and all that generation. 



MOSES. i7l 

"And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and 
multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty." 

You are to bear in mind that tiie promises made to 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, iterated and reiterated, were 
promises of abundant posterity. The Oriental people 
regarded a large household as the greatest of earthly bless- 
ings. I need not refer you to the Psalms, in which, in 
various ways, this fact is proclaimed. To be without 
children was regarded as the greatest of misfortunes, and 
to be the mother of many children was considered the most 
significant token of divine favor. 

So far as the physical is concerned, a wholesome out-of- 
door life, well tempered with labor and abundant food, 
increases population with remarkable rapidity. We know 
how it is in the insect world, the bird world, and the animal 
world. Let there be ample food and protection, and there 
will be increase at an extraordinary rate. And that which 
is true of the lower creation is true of the human family. 

Now, there was a cradle for the Israelites. It was this 
land of Goshen, where they had sufficient food, where there 
was all needed protection, and where they had moderate 
labor. Therefore it was that they " were fruitful, and 
increased abundantly, and multiplied and waxed exceed- 
ing mighty," so that "the land was filled with them." 
*' Now there arose up a new king in Egypt, which knew not Joseph." 

The dynasties of Egypt are infinitely perplexing. That 
there was a succession of dynasties in Egypt we know ; 
but exactly the line of them and the number of them are 
matters of very much dispute and difference of opinion. 
It is, however, on the whole, generally held that what is 
called the Shepherd dynasty had at the time we are dis- 
cussing come and gone — that the Egyptians had revolted 
and cast them out and the native rulers had again come to 
power. And, after four hundred years had passed from 
one dynasty to another, after one Pharaoh had succeeded 
another (for Pharaoh among the Egyptians, like Ccesar 
among the Romans, was the official name of the head of 
the state), is it strange that when they talked about Joseph 



172 BIBLE STUDIES. 

this later Pharaoh did not know much about him ? We 
look at it from the side of Israel, and we shall be in danger 
of taking sides exclusively with Israel ^nd damning Pha- 
raoh, as though there was no excuse, no palliation, nothing 
to be said for him. There is nothing to be said in exten. 
nation of his conduct. Cruelty is cruelty in any age of 
the world, and wrong policy is wrong policy wherever you 
find it : nevertheless, considering what human nature is, it 
was perfectly natural that Pharaoh should not know the 
history of this people, but should concern himself more 
about Egypt at large. 

Did Pharaoh reason about this matter ? Their increase 
had been such that it had been brought to the royal ears. 
It had been represented to Pharaoh that they were a war- 
like people, that they were filling the land of Goshen, that 
they did not mix with the Egyptians, and that they did not 
worship as the Egyptians did. He looked upon them as a 
dangerous element because he thought they would be split 
up into parties and factions, and especially because they 
might take sides with the enemies of his country. In the 
event of invasion from without they might swarm on the side 
of the adversaries of the government. Such was the view 
which Pharaoh took ; and monarchs of that day were not 
very apt to go aside from selfish considerations any more 
than they are nowadays. 

"And he said unto his people, Behold the people of the children of Israel 
are more and mightier than we : come on, let us deal wisely with them ; 
lest they multiply, and it come to pass, that, when there falleth out any 
war, they join also unto our enemies, and fight against us, and so get them 
up out of the land." 

He did not want to lose them, any more than the plant- 
ers of the South once wanted to lose the negroes ; but he 
wanted to hold them in certain conditions. 

" Therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their 
burdens. And they built for Pharaoh treasure cities, Pithom and Raam- 
ses." 

That is to say, "Let us subject this warlike tribe by the 
discipline of regular industrial organization. Let us give 



MOSES. 173 

them so much to do that they will not have time for mis- 
chief-making. Let us employ them in building cities, 
military depots, and canals. Let us see to it that they are 
so fully occupied that they will have no opportunity for 
plotting treason. Let us break their spirit by exhausting 
their strength in useful labor." That was the plan. 

" But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew. 
And they were grieved because of the children of Israel. And the Egyp- 
tians made the children of Israel to serve with rigor." 

It was a kind of brutal experiment ; and when it did not 
succeed, — 

" They made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, 
and in all manner of service in the field : all their service, wherein they 
made them serve, was with rigor." 

It was hard goodness ; for if there was anything that the 
Israelites needed it was to have their wild discursive spirit 
tamed, and to be taught industry — how to do many things 
that they did thus learn. And when Pharaoh wanted 
handicraft men he had them. They were apprenticed out 
to Pharaoh. But, as we have seen, they still multiplied : it 
must have taken many years to reveal this briefly stated 
fact. So soon as that plan failed Pharaoh fell upon a new 
one : he summoned the Hebrew midwives, and gave them 
orders to destroy in birth the male children. Female serv- 
ants were not to be dreaded in war, and they were use- 
ful as beasts of burden. 

That order led to a series of deceptions, such as you will 
find among animals and in connection with the lower con- 
ditions of human society. The midwives deceived the 
king : and when he called them to account, they said the 
reason was that the Hebrew women did not employ their 
services ; that they did not need them as the Egyptians did, 
and that therefore the children were born without their 
knowledge. They lied. The record goes further, and says, — 

"Therefore God dealt well with the midwives: and the people multi- 
plied, and waxed very mighty. And it came to pass, because the midwives 
feared God, that he made them houses." 

That is, built up their households, or families. 



174 BIBLE STUDIES. 

There is no doubt that, to the Israelites, this lie that the 
women told in behalf of humanity was a virtue. Cunning 
and craft as against oppression has always been considered 
a virtue ; and it is considered as much a virtue in our time 
as ever it was in the olden time. We organize -it into 
method, and we practice in our diplomacy and military 
operations the same craft and deceit which were practiced 
by early nations. 

Is it put down against any great soldier that he sent out 
couriers with letters containing false information, that he 
deceived the enemy, and caught them in traps that he set 
for them ? I never heard any very vehement declarations 
against military cunning, which, to give the plain English 
of it, is lying. It is not fair, however, to suppose that God 
rewarded their falsehood. They " feared God " and pro- 
tected what they believed to be his chosen people. They 
were instruments of great humanity. They were rewarded 
for their patriotism, their national spirit. 

Failing in this attempt to destroy all the male children 
that were born, Pharaoh gave command to his people to 
issue a proclamation, saying, — 

" Every son that is born ye shall cast into the river, and every daughter 
ye shall save alive." 

It is to be presumed that such an edict as this was pro- 
mulged chiefly along the banks of the river where a large 
part of the Israelites dwelt, and did not extend far to the 
north or southeast. If there had been a rigorous enforce- 
ment of it there could not have been such an augmentation 
of the nation as took place, and prepared them to go forth 
with such a great multitude. It must have had a limited 
application ; and even in the small sphere where it was 
applied it is not to be supposed, while great cruelty was 
committed, and there was an extensive slaughter of chil- 
dren, but that the mother-love often outwitted the zeal of 
tyranny. At any rate, it was the beginning of the drama 
in which Moses was the hero. And here, again, we fall 
upon one of those beautiful pictures in which the natural 
heart breaks out in the most beautiful forms. 



MOSES. 175 

"And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter 
of Levi. And the woman conceived, and bare a son : and when she saw 
him that he was a goodly child [I should like to know what mother ever did 
look upon her son without thinking that he was a goodly child], she hid 
him three months." 

He could not have cried much, or they would have found 
him out. Moses was slow of tongue in after life ; and it 
seems that he began early ! 

"And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bul- 
rushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein ; 
and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink." 

Even animals have the shrewdest instinct. Have you 
never seen a cat preserve her kittens ? I have watched the 
operation at my country home. I have seen sagacity in the 
mother that was truly surprising, as she moved her young 
from place to place whenever she thought danger threat- 
ened them. 

If that sagacity in a feline creature is so admirable, how 
much more admirable is it when, going up through many 
gradations, it develops itself in the human heart. And 
how shrewd this mother was ! Did she not know that 
that part of the river was where the daughter of Pharaoh 
was accustomed to walk with her maidens, and at times to 
bathe her feet, and perhaps her person ? And was not that 
the place to be chosen ? After she had put the child in this 
little basket, that was made water-tight, his sister and she 
"stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him." They 
watched him. I do not believe he was out for a night. 
They would have him in over night and out again early in 
the morning ; and then they would wait and watch. In 
that torrid region there was no walking at midday ; and 
Pharaoh's daughter must have walked either at evening or 
in the morning — probably in the morning. 

"And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river ; 
and her maidens walked along by the river's side ; and when she saw the 
ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. And when she had 
operued it, she saw the child : and, behold, the babe wept." 

Its cry was the sweetest oration and the most convinc- 
ing that ever was uttered, doubtless. The daughter of the 



176 BIBLE STUDIES. 

proud Pharaoh looked upon this alien child, — for she knew 
at once that it was of the Israelites ; and the babe wept ; 
and she was conquered. 

" She had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' chil- 
dren." 

Then the shrewd little sister ran up and said to her, — 

" Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may 
nurse the child for thee ? " 

It was a lucky thought. Pharaoh's daughter saw that it 
would be rather awkward for a daughter of the king to go 
back with a babe in her arms. She might not have many 
questions to answer, but there would be surmises about it ; 
and when the maid asked if she should go and get a nurse 
it was exactly what Pharaoh's daughter wanted to have 
her do. 

"And Pharaoh's daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and 
called the child's mother." 

She was all ready for it. She had been longing for 
such a call. Do you suppose a child was ever hungry that 
the mother did not know it? Nature is often stronger than 
the tongue. 

"And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse 
it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. 

"And the woman took the child, and nursed it. And the child grew, and 
she brought him unto Pharaoh's daughter, and he became her son. And 
she called his name Moses : and she said, Because I drew him out of the 
water." 

Moses means drmvn out. At that time they gave names, 
not as we do, repeating the same name over and over : they 
named their children from some circumstance ; as, for in- 
stance, when Rachel was dying she called her babe Ben-oni, 
'' Child of my Sorrow " ; but the father said, " No, Ben- 
jamin, Son of my Right-hand." And Moses was called by 
that name because he was drawn ovt. 
"And it came to pass in those days when Moses was grown " — 
That is all there is said in this history about his educa- 
tion. Later on we find the statement that he was hi'oiight 
tip in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. 



MOSES. 177 

Egypt then was really glorious. Rome had not been 
thought of. Greece was a den of robbers. There was not 
a refined people in all Media, in Persia nor in Asia. There 
were conditions that prefigured civilization ; but at that 
time there was but one radiant spot on the globe, and that 
was Egypt ; and if there was to be a movement by the hu- 
man race which should culminate in moral effulgence, it 
must be made there. Abraham's posterity were to go into 
Egypt. And then, Moses, being born, and being threatened 
with destruction, was rescued and put into the house of 
Pharaoh, where was to be found the very acme of the world 
in all philosophy, in all art, and in all religion as it had 
developed in the imperfect forms of idolatry — for, under 
all idolatry, there is a true element. 

Under the religion of every nation on the globe that 
ever worshiped or that worships to-day there is an element 
of morality which that religion faintly and imperfectly 
tries to express. There are rude nations whose concep- 
tions of God are made manifest by idols ; and, although 
those idols are so distorted as to amount to a slander upon 
the Omnipotent, they shadow forth an element of truth. 

And whatever was known of history in the time of 
Moses was nurtured in Egypt, and in the lap of Pharaoh. 
Whatever there was of mathematics (and there was a great 
deal), whatever there was of constructive engineering and 
architecture (and it was magnificent) centered there. And 
astronomy, geometry, medicine, and many manufacturing 
arts were there well advanced ; while the science of war 
was both taught and practiced. And Moses was thor- 
oughly educated in these things. As prince, he was also 
priest, and was broadly and thoroughly trained. He was 
encyclopedic. All this concatenation of events and ele- 
ments was a preparation for the work he was to do after- 
wards. And what did this man think during all that 
time ? 

The Jewish writer Josephus details legends of the mili- 
tary exploits of Moses, who conquered Ethiopia for the 
Egyptians and took to wife the daughter of the defeated 

12 



178 BIBLE STUDIES. 

king. He seems to have completed a full round both of 
mental training and practical experience to equip him for 
his real life-work, which was not to be amid the splendor 
of Egypt, but among the degraded slaves who were his 
countrymen. 

One trait that we honor is fidelity to one's own country. 
Moses was brought up with the knowledge that he was of 
Hebrew blood. He stood in a place of power. He was 
surrounded by magnificence. He had everything that the 
heart of man could desire. He had the energy that was^ 
necessary for ambition. But his heart constantly ran back 
to his own people. He thought of them sympathetically. 
That sympathy which led Jesus Christ to couple himself 
with mankind, and made him the Saviour of the world, was, 
though not in such grandeur and radiance, nor in such noble 
and heroic form, also in Moses. It would not have been 
strange if, amid the blandishments of a court, he had been 
dazzled into forgetfulness and contempt of his people. 
What if they were slaves, and in distress ? All the more did 
they need somebody at Court to intercede for them. And 
yet, the methods pursued by Moses showed the inexperience 
of the age as well as of the man. The first effort he made 
for avenging his people was a miserable blunder in every 
way. It had in it no foresight, no plan. It was a mere 
blind impulse. Blind impulses are sometimes heroic ; but 
oftentimes they are just the opposite. The narrative is 
brief. 

"And it came to pass in those days when Moses was grown [There's 
chronology for you ! In those days. It might have been when he was 
twenty or twenty-five years of age ; but it was when he was about forty, as 
understood from other sources] that he went out unto his brethren, and 
looked on their burdens : and he spied an Egyptian smiting an Hebrew, one 
of his brethren." 

If Moses had been nothing but a common man, and had 
knocked the Egyptian down, I should have said "Amen "; 
but Moses had in him the movement toward a larger 
sphere than that in which common men move, and should 
have acted accordingly, with a larger wisdom. Therefore 



MOSES. 179 

in the act which he committed, and which is here narrated, 
he w^as rash ; noble in impulse, but not wise in method. 

"And he looked this way and that way, and when he saw that there was 
no man, he slew the Egyptian, and hid him in the sand. 

"And when he went out the second day, behold, two men of the Hebrews 
strove together : and he said to him that did the wrong, Wherefore smitest 
thou thy fellow ? And he said, Who made thee a prince and a judge over 
us ? Intendest thou to kill me, as thou killedst the Egyptian ? " 

Here you see what slavery brings men to. Moses inter- 
fered as a vindicator of one of his people who was smitten, 
and slew the smiter. Then he undertook to stop a quarrel, 
to act as a mediator between two men that were striving 
together, and one of them, an enslaved man out of whom 
hard bondage had driven his manhood, turned upon him, 
like a dog separated from another dog with whom he was 
fighting, and said, "Intendest thou to kill me, as thou 
killedst the Egyptian ?" 

"And Moses feared, and said. Surely this thing is known. 
" Now when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses. But 
Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian." 

So, then, here was the first scene — a rash, impulsive 
endeavor to emphasize his detestation of the oppression of 
his people. He had expressed his sympathy for them ; 
but all he had accomplished was to excite their animosity, 
to bring himself into disgrace at Court, to make himself a 
vagabond ; and he ran away to save his own life. As to 
his people, they were oppressed more than ever before. 
The first effect of an attempt to break up slavery is to 
make the slave-master hold his victim tighter. When a 
lion has seized a lamb, woe be to the lamb if anybody tries 
to draw it out of his mouth ! Then the teeth grind it to 
powder. When power has long prevailed, and is con- 
fronted with resistance, or with attempts at emancipation 
or amelioration, the immediate result is not a help but a 
hindrance. Moreover, the first effect of attempting to lift 
men from a lower sphere to a higher is to make them your 
enemies. He that came to give salvation to the whole 
human race was rejected by those among whom he first 



l8o BIBLE STUDIES, 

sought to perform his mission. It is dangerous to touch 
the animal in men, if you would lift them up toward the 
angels ; as Moses found, and as Christ found. 

Next comes in one of those poetic pictures which so 
abound in the Bible. You will recollect how Abraham, 
then Jacob, and now Moses, carried on their courtship b}^ 
the side of wells. These wells in antiquity seem to have 
been favorably placed. 

"Now the priest of Midian had seven daughters: and they came and 
drew water, and filled the troughs to water their father's flock." 

Women had rights in those days ! 

"And the shepherds came and drove them awa)^ : but Moses stood up and 
helped them." 

Here was a courtly-bred man ; and whatever the facts 
may have been in regard to the methods he employed in 
attempting to deliver his people, he was not going to see 
seven women wronged and not have a word to say in the 
matter. Thus he vindicated his gentlemanly nature — for 
he was a gentleman, every inch of him. 

" Moses stood up and helped them, and watered their flock. And when 
they came to Reuel their father, he said, How is it that ye are come so soon 
to-day ? And they said. An Egyptian delivered us out of the hand of the 
shepherds, and also drew water enough for us, and watered the flock. 

"And he said unto his daughters, And where is he ? why is it that ye have 
left the man? Call him, that he may eat bread." 

So said the old hospitable priest of the wilderness. 

"And Moses was content to dwell with the man." 

There is a whole year represented in a sentence here, 
very likely. We are not told how long it was before he was 
contented to dwell with the man ; nor are we told how long 
it was before Reuel gave him his daughter for his wife, 
which he did. 

"And he gave Moses Zipporah his daughter. And she bare him a son, 
and he called his name Gershom [Stranger] : for he said, I have been a 
stranger in a strange land. 

"And it came to pass in process of time [or, in the course of many days] 
that the king of Egypt died." 

There's chronology again ! In process of time ! It is un- 



MOSES. i8i 

derstood that Moses abode many years in the wilderness. 
He was forty years old when he went there, it is said. 
He abode there, we are told, about forty years. This was 
a time for discipline, for meditation, for education into 
patient submission ; and dwelling with this simple priest 
doubtless he ripened inwardly much of the knowledge he 
had derived from his intercourse with the Court of Pha- 
raoh. 

"And the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they 
cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage. And God 
heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham., 
with Isaac, and with Jacob." 

You would suppose, from this statement, that God never 
thought of them for four hundred years, and that they 
waked him up, and that he said, " Oh yes, I recollect 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob " ; but no, this is the infantine 
way of representing it. It is the way in which it was then 
perfectly natural for men to represent it. God's provi- 
dence was watching this people all the time, and while the 
process of development was going on under the great 
stimulating influences of nature, it was God working upon 
them through natural laws, just as much as when he spoke 
from Mount Sinai, by his voice of thunder, or when he 
wrote the law upon the tables of stone. He was not then 
more actively engaged in working out the destiny of his 
people than when, in his providence, he was preparing them 
to increase and multiply in Egypt. 

"And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto 
them." 

At this point we must leave the narrative to-night, to be 
resumed, God willing, next Sunday evening. 

I shall now ask your attention for a single moment to 
the analogy which exists between our own experience and 
that which has been so perfectly sketched here. We have 
oppressed a great people in our midst. They made our 
wealth, they ministered to our luxury, and we despised 
them : not probably more than Pharaoh despised the shep- 
herds ; but in our case there was a difference of complexion 



/82 BIBLE STUDIES. 

and feature ; and this great nation walked in the footsteps 
of Pharaoh and despised the Negroes. Then came the 
efforts to bring to pass their emancipation, which, in their 
early stages, may well be considered as having been rash, as 
were the first attempts of Moses to vindicate his people. 
While I honor the testimony of Mr. Garrison, Mr. Phillips, 
and men associated with them, I do not regard them as 
being emancipators. As in the case of Moses, their first 
efforts for the amelioration of the condition of the slaves 
led to violent opposition, instead of accomplishing the end 
they had in view. I did not utter one word of criticism 
concerning them at that time ; everybody was throwing 
stones at them, and, as you know, I stood with and for them 
in the matter of their free speech. But, as a matter of fact 
to-day, I do declare that the invective and abuse indulged 
in by those men did not promote emancipation, but had 
just the contrary effect. Although they did have an influ- 
ence in the right direction, that influence was derived, not 
from the severe and rash statements they made, but from 
their appeal to that love of liberty, that sense of justice, 
which resides in every man who has not a personal inter- 
est in oppression.* 

The first effect of agitation created by abolitionists such 
as these was not favorable to the cause for which they la- 
bored. In the Eastern cities, where commerce reigned, 
the church was well-nigh dumb on the subject of slavery. 
There was almost no testimony there in regard to it ; and 
the indignant utterances of Garrison and Phillips were true, 



*In a discourse preached February lo, 1884, in memory of Wendell 
Phillips, Mr. Beecher said : " He was an aristocrat by descent and by 
nature — a noble one, but a thorough aristocrat. . . . He was aristo- 
cratic in his pride, and lived higher than most men lived. He was called of 
God as truly as ever Moses and the prophets were : not exactly for the same 
great ends, but in consonance with them. . . . The power to discern 
right amid all the wrappings of interest and all the seductions of ambition was 
singularly his. To choose the lowly for their sake ; to abandon all favor, 
all power, all comfort, all ambition, all greatness — that was his genius and 
glory. ... He has become to us a lesson, an example, his whole his- 
tory an encouragement to manhood — to heroic manhood." 



MOSES. 183 

if not wise. But in the great Western community, where I 
lived, the earliest emancipators and strongest abolitionists 
were in the church. The first vote I ever cast in a church 
in my life was in the Presbytery of Indianapolis, where I 
voted, in connection with every other man there, minister 
or elder, that we would neither license nor retain any man 
w^ho held slaves, unless he could satisfy us that he held 
them against his own will, and for their benefit ; and I 
bear witness that the leading men in the West gave their 
testimony against slavery along with Christian ministers. 
There are those whose memory goes back with mine to 
men who labored in poverty for this cause whose great 
ends were unknown, and are not known to-day, but who 
stand so high, I believe, that if I rise to the heavenly estate 
I shall hardly be w^orthy to unloose their shoe's latchet^ 
shod with light as they are before the Throne. 

To all the early anti-slavery men — especially the Eastern 
abolitionists — it w'as constantly said, "You only make 
slavery w^orse." Their early counsels, of repudiating the 
Constitution in the interest of libert}^, w^ere overruled by 
the providence of God, and, as in the case of the Israelites, 
events, in the hand of the Divine Leader, made way for 
wiser and more effective methods. And yet the impulse 
was right, and bold ; the beginning had to be made. 

When Moses interfered for his people they themselves 
did not understand wdiat he meant. They cried out against 
him. They resented his early attempts to emancipate them, 
which made tbeir yoke heavier and their sufferings greater. 
It is the nature of slavery to make people ignorant and 
servile inside as well as outside. 

I will not go farther with this analogy — because I have 
not developed the history of Moses and the emancipation 
which he wrought — except to say briefly that the lion 
would not give up his prey until he was smitten with the 
sword, and his own blood flowed. Our people, whatever 
they may have talked, refused to let the oppressed go free 
until He who smote Pharaoh with many plagues, and dev- 
astated his kingdom, came down in robust judgment, and 



1 84 BIBLE STUDIES. 

blood flowed to the horses' bridles. The God that emanci- 
pated the Israelites emancipated the Africans, and let them 
go free. We are not, therefore, to re^d this history with- 
out some allusions and applications to current history 
among our own selves. 



X. 

EMANCIPATION. 



In the very general survey which we have been making, 
for several Sunday nights, of the books of the Old Testa- 
ment, we have finished the book of Genesis, and now enter 
upon the second book — namely, Exodus. The contents 
of this book are divided into two parts : that which gives 
an account of the going-forth of the Israelites from the 
land of Egypt, — the first twelve or thirteen chapters, — and 
that which gives a history, in part, of their wanderings, 
but especially of the institutions and customs which were 
framed by Moses, and which afterwards became the con- 
stitution, religious and civil, of the kingdom of Israel. 

To-night we have come to the great drama of Emancipa- 
tion. To me this history, which is usually called the 
"History of the Ten Plagues," comes bringing remem- 
brances of my childhood. I was brought up when there 
were almost no books for children. An aunt, revered and 
beloved, who for a portion of the time acted toward me 
the part of a mother, was accustomed to promise readings 
from Scripture as a reward for good conduct ; and as I 
was (of course) a good boy, I almost always had the prom- 
ised reward. Among the favorite themes chosen — although 
I was not quite old enough to enter fully into an under- 
standing of that startling, memorable, and wonderful 
history — was the "ten plagues." On the whole, I think 
I took more satisfaction in the ten plagues than the Egyp- 
tians did. They were very dear to me. They gratified both 
the upper and the under nature in me — the sense of power, 



Sunday evening, December 27, 1878. Lesson : Psa. cxxxviii. 



1 86 BIBLE STUDIES 

and the sense of retributive justice, which is very strong in 
children and'in uncultivated people. I would that I could 
look with the same eyes and the same unquestioning feelings 
upon them now that I did then. However, other things 
have come in, and on the whole the treasure of knowledge 
and the great comfort of Scripture are a thousand times 
more than they were in my childhood ; the Book has grovv'n 
as I have grown, and has twined itself into the habit's of 
miy thought and feeling and life. 

I shall not undertake to interrupt the general course of 
the statement of the narrative to-night by pausing to dis- 
cuss difficulties. There are enough of them. Whatever 
theory you may take, — whether you consider this as a 
poetical drama based upon history, or whether you regard 
it as a historical statement of facts and developments, — 
there are difficulties. For instance, we have, by the Gospel 
of Christ, been brought upon a moral ground which leads 
us to shrink from direct falsehoods ; and yet, at the same 
time, they were practiced by Moses upon Pharaoh, and so 
related as if direct deceptions were commanded of God. 
It is said : — 

"And thou shalt come, thou and the elders of Israel, unto the king of 
Egypt, and ye shall say unto him, The Lord God of the Hebrews hath met 
with us : and now let us go, we beseech thee, three days' journey into the 
wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God." 

The mention of the number of days was merely a mild 
pretense ; what was meant, was, " Let us go." But we are 
told that Moses was commanded to say this. It is said that 
God commanded him to do it. Did God tell him to say 
so ? If he did not, where is the narrative ? If he did, where 
is God ? There is a difficulty here, to which I shall on some 
other occasion address myself. 

Then, again, if it had been : " When the Israelites go 
forth out of Egypt they shall requite themselves for what, 
as slaves, they have suffered, by taking possession of what- 
ever they can ; when they go out to the wilderness, to set 
up housekeeping, they shall remunerate themselves for 
laboring hundreds of years to increase the wealth of their 



EMANCIPATION. 187 

masters, by helping themselves to an equivalent of that 
out of which they have been defrauded," — that would have 
been according to the laws of war, and not unjust or 
immoral. But we are told that they were commanded to 
" borrow." They were commanded to make a pretense of 
only wanting a little while the articles they should ask the 
Egyptians to let them have, when they knew that they were 
going to keep them. This gives rise, not only to a question 
of truth, of veracity, but to a question of honesty. Our 
modern educated conscience takes exception (on Sundays !) 
to such pretenses. 

Then comes that which has been the difficulty of ages — 
namely, God's " hardening " of Pharaoh's heart ; — com- 
manding him to do things, and then " hardening his 
heart " so that he could not or would not do them. All 
questions which cluster around this difficulty have existed 
through generations, and will exist. On whatever ground 
you put such questions, there are difficulties connected with 
them. These difficulties, as I have already said, I shall 
reserve for a separate discourse, in which I shall give 
them the best treatment I can. 

There are two classes of men who read the accounts 
contained in the early chapters of Exodus. There are 
those that look at them from the standpoint of a belief in 
a personal God, who not only is able to work miracles, but 
does work, and in all ages has worked, miracles. There is 
to me no philosophical difficulty on the subject of miracles. 
If there be a personal God, — and, surely, I trust we all 
believe there is, — if the whole physical globe is, in some 
sense, a school in which he develops and educates the 
human race, his power to control material elements so that 
they shall further his supreme designs among men upon 
earth cannot seem strange ; so, it is reduced to the simple 
question of fact. Does God work miracles ? Did he work 
miracles ? 

The allegation that the order of nature cannot be inter- 
fered with, and that there is no evidence to show that it 
has ever been interfered with, amounts to very little with 



1 88 BIBLE STCDIES. 

me. I can believe tliat new forces may be interposed par- 
allel with stated and regular forces, if there be a ruling 
God, and if he chooses, for moral ends^ to interpose them ; 
and I can see that if done at all it would naturally be done 
in the infancy of the human race, as a substitute for higher 
methods until they were able to employ those methods. I 
can understand, in other words, that many miracles — all 
of which, except those of Jesus, were wrought through 
men — were merely the enabling of exceptional men to take 
hold of natural laws higher up than ordinary men could 
take hold of them, and use them with an efficiency, a 
scope, a skill, such as men at large cannot give them. I 
believe in miracles — not in everything that is called a mira- 
cle, but at large in a system of miracles ; and, once admit- 
ting that, there is no difficulty in so far as miracles are 
concerned. It is just as easy to turn water into wine as it 
is to make a grape from which wine can be made. It is as 
easy for God to perform special acts, if he please to do it, 
as it is for him to do many other things that he does. If 
there is an end worthy of such interposition as may be 
necessary for the creation of a new law or method in the 
ph3^sical globe, I see no reason why he should not exercise 
his omnipotent power for the accomplishment of that end. 
And in a history that, however strange it may be to ordi- 
nary experience, unfolds itself miraculously, there can be 
no difficulty to those who believe in a God that can work 
by laws in a sphere higher than men can, or that can work 
for special ends by interposing parallel forces alongside of 
those working according to the usual natural laws. 

There are those, however, who believe in religion and 
in the Bible to a great extent, but who believe in these 
things as families in reduced circumstances in England 
used to believe in old mansions and castles. There were the 
structures, with magnificent rooms in them ; but then, it 
was cold and bleak, and the impoverished family were not 
able to furnish them and live in them. There were vast 
halls, once filled with kings, knights, and courtiers, but they 
were beyond the present family necessities. So, they were 



EMANCIPA TION. 1 89 

unused, except that they were given up to rats, owls, and 
what not. There are a great many persons who are so 
reduced in faith that they say, " The chambers of the Old 
Testament had better be shut up, for we are not able to 
furnish them and live in them." They make use of certain 
Vooms in the New Testament, and say, '' We are believers 
not in the whole Bible, but in a considerable part of it." 

But, in one way or another, according to what seems to 
me their aims, I believe in the entire Scriptures. There 
are portions of the Old Testament that relate to the early 
unfolding of the race, which are not to be interpreted lit- 
erally ; but they remain as history and as literature, and 
are valuable for inspiration, for doctrine, for correction, for 
right-living, that the man of God may be thoroughly fur- 
nished to every good work. 

There are men, however, who cannot thus accept the Bible. 
The}?" are in our churches. They are under our ministerial 
care. They cannot manage the difficulties they find in the 
Word of God. They huddle themselves in portions of the 
New Testament, and say, "We believe in so much, and are 
inhabiting such and such chambers in the Bible, but there 
are rooms which we are unable to make use of." 

Now, it seems to me that a great deal more than is being 
done might be done for those that are out of the way by 
reason of their lack of faith. For exam.ple, can these two 
classes of men — those who believe in the miraculous power 
and interposition of God, and those who believe that God 
never did nor does work miracles, and that everything 
comes to pass by the regular accredited forces of nature — 
can they both go together through the histor}^ of the 
emancipation of the Israelites and make profitable use of 
that whole statement of Scripture? I believe they can. 
For their sakes I suggest a supposition — and it is not at 
variance with what we know to have been the habits of 
men in early days. The suggestion is that the first histo- 
rians were poets. They had the poetic instinct, so that 
primitive history, the history of the earliest nations, was 
more poetry than prose. It was more or less allegorical 



I90 BIBLE STUDIES. 

and dramatic. Suppose, then, that this history was pre- 
sented as a drama ; and not as an invented drama — not 
like one of Milton's great epic poems, as, for instance, 
" Paradise Lost," which was wrought out by the imagina- 
tion, and is not a literal statement of fact, but originated 
in his own brain from a mere hint in the Bible. It is a 
magnificent poem, but it is imaginary from beginning to 
end, not being based on known, recorded historical facts. 
A great deal of the matter in this poem by Milton is from 
the Bible ; there is in it a certain tone which reminds one 
of the patriarchs and prophets ; but from the tentative 
brain of John Milton there came splendid recitations of 
scenes which never took place, and the like of which never 
occurred. 

These, however, are very different from the allegory, 
" Pilgrim's Progress," which, later, John Bunyan wrote in 
his prison. In this allegory the outside history has no ex- 
istence at all, and yet there is a most admirable inside his- 
tory. The evolution of the universe by which a man rises 
from a lower life to a Christian life, and progresses in that 
Christian life, was never put into a sermon so successfully 
as it is set forth in this allegory. You have here an alle- 
gory founded on fact — an allegory all the circumstances of 
which are imaginary, yet which is full of truth. 

Now, is it not possible that there may be an irregular, 
and in some sense an anomalous, internal drama which shall 
represent substantially the progress of historical events, 
and yet be so constructed that there shall be a filling up 
by the imagination of the intervening spaces concerning 
which there is no record, — a drapery, as it were, given to 
facts and sequences, — thus securing to nascent histories a 
larger form and a sublimer presentation ? 

I do not say that this is so here, but I say that it is pos- 
sible, to such an extent that men who shrink from a recog- 
nition of positive miracles may look upon this whole history 
as a magnificent drama, adorned with imaginative ele- 
ments, yet representing interiorly, with truth, the emanci- 
pation and founding of a nation. 



EMANCIPA TION. 



91 



Therefore, you can follow me to-night from either point 
of view — whether you regard the record as an allegory 
or a drama, or whether you regard it simply as a plain nar- 
rative of the wonder-working power of God, historical, 
and to be judged on historical grounds. I invite you thus 
to go with me, and take in this portion of Scripture. 

We begin at the point where we left off last Sabbath 
evening. The birth of Moses and his preservation ; the 
wonderful providence by which he received an education in 
the very heart of the most civilized nation of antiquity, 
being of the royal family by reason of his adoptive mother ; 
the fact that he acquired all the wisdom of the Egyptians, 
and became a great logician, reputed soldier, and adminis- 
trator, — these things were recited ; but the record is void 
of much information which one would naturally expect 
would be given with them. 

Moses is said to have been forty years old when he im- 
prudently acted under an impulse in first attempting to 
vindicate his people ; but here dates are very uncertain, as 
they are in regard to many things which are recorded in 
the Bible. At any rate, it is an incidental matter, and is 
not of much importance. As though the peasant Hebrew 
mother was so firmly linked with Moses in the brilliant 
court of Pharaoh that between her and him ran the um- 
bilical cord of her heart, in the midst of scenes of grandeur 
he was the center of her admiration and affection, and his 
own heart was with his countrymen. Unwisely he slew an 
Egyptian that was smiting a Hebrew ; and the next day, 
when he sought to perform another good act by separating 
two quarreling Hebrews, one of them turned upon him, 
and said, " Intendest thou to slay me as thou killedst the 
Egyptian ? " 

When Moses found that the thing was known, he feared 
and fled eastward to the land of Midian in the Sinaitic 
Peninsula, and there, having married a daughter of Jethro, 
the priest of Midian, he dwelt with him and kept his flocks. 
This man, who, for the age in which he lived, was encyclo- 
pedic in knowledge, became, for many long years — forty, the 



192 BIBLE STUDIES. 

record says — a humble shepherd. What his thoughts and 
feelings were during that time you can imagine as well as I. 
We now reach a scene in which this retirement comes 
to an end. 

"Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: 
and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain 
of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the Lord appeared mito him in a 
flame of fire out of the midst of a bush : and he looked, and, behold, the 
bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed." 

It was doubtless an acacia bush, or tree, as that was al- 
most the only tree in that region. It seemed luminous to 
his eye. It was burning, but the flame was innocuous. It 
was a light, a fire that did not consume. 

"And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the 
bush is not burnt. And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, 
God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. 
And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not njgh hither : put off thy 
shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground." 

Wherever a man's soul is brought into the presence of 
God Almighty the ground is sacred, whether it be in a 
church or on a ledge, on a crag or in a cathedral. It is 
holy ground where a man consciously meets his God. 

" Moreover he said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the 
God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." 

k 

In our day men do not need to be told who God is ; he 
is the theme of inspiration from the cradle up : but in 
those early days men supposed the world to be populated 
with all sorts of gods, every great phenomenon being 
regarded by men as divine, or as the result of the action 
of some deity. There had come out of Padan-aram one 
man who held to the unity of God ; who believed that the 
heavens above and the earth beneath were under the do- 
minion of one thinking, willing, controlling God. To the 
Israelites that one God was unrepresented. There were to 
them no gods in the shape of naiads or spirits. There was 
only one God ; and he was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob. These three patriarchs and the twelve chiefs of 
Israel bore down to us from antiquity the precious truth of 



EMANCIPA TIOlV. 1 9 3 

one God. How far the Israelites had forgotten him in 
their Egyptian corruption, we do not know ; liow far even 
Moses may have wandered in religious speculation in his 
Eg3^ptian education, we are not told. But his years of re- 
tirement and meditation had evidently prepared him for 
a great conviction. 

" The Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are 
in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for J. 
know their sorrows ; and I am come down to deliver them out of the hand 
of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land 
and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey ; unto the place of 
the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and 
the Hivites, and the Jebusites. Now therefore, behold, the cry of the 
children of Israel is come unto me : and I have also seen the oppression 
wherewith the Egyptians oppress them. Come now, therefore, and I will 
send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people the chil- 
dren of Israel out of Egypt." 

Those years in the wilderness had not been ineffectual in 
Moses. How ripe he was ! He ran at first without any call, 
and, actuated by a vague, youthful, romantic enthusiasm, 
he meant, by his own right hand, to destroy the oppressors 
of his country. Yet now, chastened, enlarged in knowl- 
edge, when called to this very same task by the God of 
his fathers he shrank back in modesty, and said to God, — 

" Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring 
forth the children of Israel out of Egypt ? And he said, Certainly I will 
be with thee ; and this shall be a token unto thee, that I have sent thee : 
When thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God 
u]3on this mountain. 

"And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of 
Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto 
you ; and they shall say to me, What is his name ? what shall I say unto 
them ? " 

Then comes one of the most sublime of enunciations. 

"And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM." 

A God, he is, that cannot be represented by picture, by 
statue, nor by any language — a God so vast, so wonderful, 
so beyond the measure of human thought or conception, 
that he is undescribed and indescribable. 

"And he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM 
13 



194 ' BIBLE STUDIES. 

[the Living, the Existing] hath sent me unto you. And God said moreove. 
unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, Jehovah, God. 
of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of 
Jacob, hath sent me unto you: this is my name -forever, and this is my me- 
morial unto all generations." 

A little further on, God explains that he appeared unto 
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob as El Shaddai — God Almighty, 
but by his name Jehovah— / Am (or perhaps more strictly, 
/ Will Be) was he not made known unto them. From 
this time forth in the Old Testament Scriptures the name 
appears ; but, owing to the reverential fear of the Jews to 
pronounce it, it has been represented by the words the 
Lord. The name itself, however, is so full of meaning that 
it is a pity not to have retained it.* 

*' Go, and gather the elders of Israel together, and say unto them, Jehovah, 
God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared 
unto me, saying, I have surely visited you, and seen that which was done to 
you in Egypt : and I have said, I will bring you up out of the affliction of 
Egypt unto the land of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, 
and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, unto a land flowing 
with milk and honey. And they shall hearken to thy voice : and thou shalt 
come, thou and the elders of Israel, unto the king of Egypt, and ye shall 
say unto him, Jehovah, the God of the Hebrews, hath met with us : and 
now let us go, we beseech thee, three days' journey into the wilderness, that 
we may sacrifice to Jehovah, our God. And I am sure that the king of 
Egypt will not let you go, no, not by a mighty hand. And I will stretch 
out my hand, and smite Egypt with all my wonders which I will do in the 
midst thereof : and after that he will let you go. And I will give this peo- 
ple favor in the sight of the Egyptians : and it shall come to pass, that, when 
ye go, ye shall not go empty: but every woman shall borrow of her neigh- 
bor, and of her that sojourneth in her house, jewels of silver, and jewels of 
gold, and raiment : and ye shall put them upon your sons, and upon yom 
daughters ; and ye shall spoil the Egyptians. 

"And Moses answered and said. But, behold, they will not believe me, nor 
hearken unto my voice : for they will say, Jehovah hath not appeared unto 
thee." 



* In the spirit of this, the name has been used in certain quoted Scrip- 
tural passages, where the personality of the God of the Hebrews in distinc- 
tion from the "other gods," of Egypt and surrounding nations, seems to be 
the point of emphasis. The American members of the Old Testament 
Revision Company, in the Revised Version issued in 1885, express their pref- 
erence to " Substitute the Divine name 'Jehovah' wherever it occurs in the 
Hebrew text for * the Lord ' and ' God.' " — Editor, 



EMANCIPA TION. 1 9 5 

Then God gives him the first sign : casting his rod upon 
the ground it became a serpent, and at the command of 
God he seized it, when it again became a rod. 

"And Jehovah said furthermore unto him, Put now thine hand into thy 
bosom. And he put his hand into his bosom : and when he took it out, 
behold, his hand was leprous as snow. And he said. Put thine hand into 
thy bosom again. And he put his hand into his bosom again ; and plucked 
it out of his bosom, and, behold, it was turned again as his other flesh. 

"And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe thee, neither hearken 
to the voice of the first sign, that they will believe the voice of the latter 
sign. And it shall come to pass, if they will not believe also these two 
signs, neither hearken unto thy voice, that thou shalt take of the water of 
the river, and pour it upon the dry land : and the water which thou takest 
out of the river shall become blood upon the dry land." 

The Lord assured Moses that in tliese signs the most of 
his people would have faith that he came authenticated by 
the divine authority. 

"And Moses said, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor 
since thou hast spoken unto thy servant : but I am slow of speech, and of a 
slow tongue. 

"And the Lord said unto him. Who hath made man's mouth ? or who 
maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind ? Is it not I, Jehovah ? 
Now therefore go, and I will be with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou 
shalt say." 

Reluctant Moses could not answer a word ; but still he 
did not v/ant to go. 

"And he said, O my Lord, send, I pray thee, by the hand of him whom 
thou wilt send. And the anger of Jehovah was kindled against Moses, and 
he said. Is not Aaron the Leyite thy brother? I know that he can speak 
well. And also, behold, he cometh forth to meet thee : and when he seeth 
thee, he will be glad in his heart. And thou shalt speak unto him, and put 
words in his mouth : and I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, and 
\y'\\\ teach you what ye shall do. And he shall be thy spokesman unto the 
people : and he shall be, even he shall be to thee instead of a mouth, and 
thou shalt be to him instead of God. And thou shalt take this rod in 
thine hand, wherewith thou shalt do signs." 

We are to understand that from this time when Moses 
did anything publicly he did it through the ministration 
of Aaron. 

Now we come to the journey of Moses with his wife and 



196 BIBLE STUDIES. 

two sons back to Egypt. There is a scene of which we 
can give no explanation. 

"And it came to pass by the way in the inij, that the Lord met him and 
sought to kill him." 

The possible explanation is that Moses was taken sick, 
but that his wife supposed him to be smitten by the Lord. 

"And the Lord said to Aaron, Go into the wilderness to meet Moses. 
And he went, and met him in the mount of God, and kissed him. And 
Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord who had sent him, and all the 
signs which he had commanded him. And Moses and Aaron went and 
gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel : and Aaron spake 
all the words which the Lord had spoken unto Moses, and did the signs in 
the sight of the people. And the people believed : and when they heard 
that the Lord had visited the children of Israel, and that he had looked upon 
their affliction, then they bowed their heads and worshiped." 

A short life of faith and of reverence ! 

"And afterward Moses and Aaron went in, and told Pharaoh, Thus saith 
Jehovah, the God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast 
unto me in the wilderness. 

"And Pharaoh said. Who is Jehovah, that I should obey his voice to let 
Israel go ? I know not Jehovah, neither will I let Israel go. 

"And they said. The God of the Hebrews hath met with us : let us go, 
we pray thee, three days' journey into the desert, and sacrifice unto Jehovah 
our God; lest he fall upon us with pestilence, or with the sword. 

"And the king of Egypt said unto them. Wherefore do ye, Moses and 
Aaron, let the people from their works [hinder them from their work] ? 
Get you unto your burdens. And Pharaoh said, Behold, the people of the 
land now are many, and ye make them rest from their burdens. And Pha- 
raoh commanded the same day the taskmasters of the people, and their offi- 
cers, saying, Ye shall no more give the people straw to make brick, as here- 
tofore : let. them go and gather straw for themselves. And the tale of the 
bricks, which they did make heretofore, ye shall lay upon them ; ye shall not 
diminish aught thereof : for they be idle ; therefore they cry, saying, Let us 
go and sacrifice to our God. Let there more work be laid upon the men, 
that they may labor therein ; and let them not regard vain words. 

" So the people were scattered abroad throughout all the land of Egypt to 
gather stubble instead of straw. And the taskmasters hasted them, say- 
ing, Fulfill your works, your daily tasks, as when there was straw. And the 
officers of the children of Israel, which Pharaoh's taskmasters had set over 
them, were beaten, and demanded, Wherefore have ye not fulfilled your 
task in making brick both yesterday and to-day as heretofore? 

"Then the officers of the children of Israel came and cried unto Pharaoh, 
saying, Wherefore dealest thou thus with thy servants? There is no straw 



EMANCIPA no A \ 1 97 

given unto thy servants, and they say to us, Make brick: and, behold, thy 
servants are beaten; but the fault is in thine own people. But he said. Ye 
are idle, ye are idle : therefore ye say, Let us go and do sacrifice to Jehovah. 
Go therefore now, and work ; for there shall no straw be given you, yet 
shall ye deliver the tale of bricks." 

This was more than even slave human nature could 
bear; and when Moses and Aaron went back to meet them 
they said unto them, — 

"Jehovah look upon you, and judge; because ye have made our savor 
to be abhorred in the eyes of Pharaoh, and in the eyes of his servants, to 
put a sword in their hand to slay us." 

Again they turned on their emancipators that would have 
been. 

"And Moses returned unto the Lord, and said. Lord, wherefore hast thou 
so evil entreated this people ? why is it that thou hast sent me ? For since 
I came to Pharaoh to speak in thy name, he hath done evil to this people- 
neither hast thou delivered thy people at all. Then the Lord ,said unto 
Moses, Now shalt thou see what I will do to Pharaoh : for with a strong 
hand shall he let them go, and with a strong hand shall he drive them out 
of his land." 

After a rehearsal of the various points of history, to 
emphasize the memory of the fathers and of God's admin- 
istration, there follows an account, doubtless taken from 
interjected fragments in the narrative, of the heads of the 
house of Israel. 

"And the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, When Pha- 
raoh shall speak unto you. Show a miracle for you : then thou shalt say unto 
Aaron, Take thy rod, and cast it before Pharaoh, and it shall become a ser- 
pent. And Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharaoh, and they did so as the 
Lord had commanded : and Aaron cast down his rod before Pharaoh, and 
before his servants, and it became a serpent. Then Pharaoh also called the 
wise men and the sorcerers : now the magicians of Egypt, they also did in like 
manner with their enchantments. For they cast down every man his rod, 
and they became serpents: but Aaron's rod swallowed up their rods. And 
he hardened Pharaoh's heart, that he hearkened not unto them ; as the 
Lord had said. And the Lord said unto Moses, Pharaoh's heart is hardened, 
he refuseth to let the people go. Get thee unto Pharaoh in the morning." 

Now, by whichever theory men take of this history, we 
enter upon a scene which is of like interest — namely, what 
may be called the struggle between dynasty and democ- 
racy. It is a contest between the spirit of freedom and 



198 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the spirit of oppression, between justice and liberty and 
proud monarchic power despotically established. The his- 
tories are of efforts to make slaves free^ and of the bombard- 
ing, the beating down, of the dynastic oppressor. These 
histories follow in regular order ; and it is to the points 
involved in them that all these miracles are addressed. 

"And the Lord spake unto Moses, Say unto Aaron, Take thy rod, and 
stretch out thine hand upon the waters of Egypt, upon their streams, upon 
their rivers, and upon their ponds, and upon all their pools of water, that 
they may become blood ; and that there may be blood throughout all the 
land of Egypt, both in vessels of wood, and in vessels of stone. 

"And Moses and Aaron did so, as the Lord commanded; and he lifted up 
the rod, and smote the waters that were in the river, in the sight of Pharaoh, 
and in the sight of his servants ; and all the waters that were in the river 
were turned to blood. And the fish that was in the river died ; and the 
river stank, and the Egyptians could not drink of the water of the river ; 
and there was blood throughout all the land of Egypt. And the magicians 
of Egypt did so with their enchantments : and Pharaoh's heart w^as hardened, 
neither did he hearken unto them ; as the Lord had said. And Pharaoh 
turned and went into his house, neither did he set his heart to this also. 
And all the Egyptians digged around about the river for water to drink; 
for they could not drink of the w^ater of the river." 

Then Moses and Aaron go to Pharaoh again and threaten 
another plague upon him. 

"And the Lord spake unto Moses, Go unto Pharaoh, and say unto him, 
Thus saith the Lord, Let my people go, that they may serve me. And if 
thou refuse to let them go, behold, I will smite all thy borders with frogs : 
and the river shall bring forth frogs abundantly, which shall go up and 
come into thine house, and into thy bedchamber, and upon thy bed, and into 
the house of thy servants, and upon thy people, and into thine ovens, and 
into thy kneadingtroughs : and the frogs shall come up both on thee, and 
upon thy people, and upon all thy servants. And the Lord spake unto 
Moses, Say unto Aaron, Stretch forth thine hand with thy rod over the 
streams, over the rivers, and over the ponds, and cause frogs to come up 
upon the land of Egypt." 

A few frogs might be evaded or avoided, though with 
disgust ; but to have the whole land carpeted with them, 
to step on them, to go wading among them as in the mud, 
and crusliing them under one's feet, would be disagreeable, 
to say the least. There was not, perhaps, anything ter- 
rific in it but there was enougli tliat was repulsive. 



EMANCIFA 7Y0A \ 1 99 

"Then Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron, and said, Intreat Jehovah, 
that he may take away the frogs from me, and from my people ; and I will 
let the people go, that they may do sacrifice unto Jehovah. And Moses said 
unto Pharaoh, Glory over me : when shall I intreat for thee, and for thy 
servants, and for thy people, to destroy the frogs from thee and thy houses, 
that they may remain in the river only ? And he said, To-morrow. And he 
said, Be it according to thy word : that thou mayest know that there is none 
like unto Jehovah our God. And the frogs shall depart from thee, and 
from thy houses, and from thy servants, and from thy people; they shall re- 
main in the river only. 

"And Moses and Aaron went out from Pharaoh : and Moses cried unto 
the Lord because of the frogs which he had brought against Pharaoh. And 
the Lord did according to the word of Moses ; and the frogs died out of the 
houses, out of the villages, and out of the fields. And they gathered them 
together upon heaps : and the land stank." 

When the evil was removed Pharaoh returned to his 
obstinac}'. 

"And the Lord said unto Moses, Say unto Aaron, Stretch out tliy rod, 
and smite the dust of the land, that it may become lice throughout ail the 
land of Egypt." 

This was bringing the matter liome ! 

"And they did so ; for Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod, and 
smote the dust of the earth, and it became lice in man, and in beast ; all 
the dust of the land became lice throughout all the land of Egypt. And 
the magicians did so with their enchantments to bring forth lice, but they 
could not : so there were lice upon man, and upon beast. Then the magi- 
cians said unto Pharaoh, This is the finger of God : and Pharaoh's heart 
was hardened, and he hearkened not unto them ; as the Lord had said. 

"And the Lord said unto Moses, Rise up early in the morning, and stand 
before Pharaoh ; lo, he cometh forth to the water ; and say unto him, Thus 
saith Jehovah, Let my people go, that they may serve me. Else, if thou 
wilt not let my people go, behold, I will send swarms of flies upon thee, 
and upon thy servants, and upon thy people, and into thy houses : and the 
houses of the Egyptians shall be full of swarms of flies, and also the ground 
whereon they are. And I will sever in that day the land of Goshen, in 
which my people dwell, that no swarms of flies shall be there; to the 
end thou mayest know that I am Jehovah in the midst of the earth. And I 
will put a division between my people and thy people : to-morrow shall 
this sipn be. 

"And the Lord did so ; and there came a grievous swarm of flies into the 
house o£ Pharaoh, and into his servants' houses, and into all the land of 
Egypt : the land was corrupted by reason of the swarm of flies. And Pha- 
raoh called for Moses and for Aaron, and said. Go ye, sacrifice to your God 
in the land [that is, here, in Egypt]. And Moses said, It is not meet so to 



200 BIBLE STUDIES. 

do ; for we shall sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians to the Lord our 
God : lo, shall we sacrifice the abomination of the Egyptians before their 
eyes, and will they not stone us ? We will go three days' journey into the 
wilderness, and sacrifice to Jehovah our God ; 'as he shall command us. 
And Pharaoh said, I will let you go, that ye may sacrifice to Jehovah, your 
God, in the wilderness ; only ye shall not go very far away : intreatfor me. 

"And Moses said, Behold, I go out from thee, and I will intreat Jehovah 
that the swarms of flies may depart from Pharaoh, from his servants, and 
from his people, to-morrow : but let not Pharaoh deal deceitfully any more 
in not letting the people go to sacrifice to Jehovah. 

"And Moses went out from Pharaoh, and intreated the Lord. And the 
Lord did according to the word of Moses ; and he removed the swarms of 
flies from Pharaoh, from his servants, and from his people : there remained 
not one. And Pharaoh hardened his heart at this time also, neither would 
he let the people go." 

Then still more strenuous measures were resorted to. 

"All the cattle of Egypt died ; but of the cattle of the children of 
Israel died not one. And Pharaoh sent, and, behold, there was not 
one of the cattle of the Israelites dead. And the heart of Pharaoh was 
hardened, and he did not let the people go. 

" And the Lord said unto Moses and unto Aaron, Take to you hand- 
fuls of ashes of the furnace, and let Moses sprinkle it toward the heaven 
in the sight of Pharaoh. And it shall become small dust in all the land 
of Egypt, and shall be a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and 
upon beast, throughout all the land of Egypt. And they took ashes of 
the furnace, and stood [before Pharaoh; and Moses sprinkled it up 
toward heaven ; and it became a boil breaking forth with blains upon 
man, and upon beast. And the magicians could not stand before Moses 
because of the boils; for the boil was upon the magicians, and upon all 
the Egyptians. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh, and he 
hearkened not unto them; as the Lord had spoken unto Moses. 

"So there was hail, and fire mingled with tb.e hail, very grievous, such as 
there was none like it in all the land of Egypt since it became a nation. 
And the hail smote throughout all the land of Egypt all that was in the 
field, both man and beast ; and the hail smote every herb of the field, and 
brake every tree of the field. Only in the land of Goshen, where the chil- 
dren of Israel were, was there no hail." 

Pharaoh now sent for Moses and Aaron, and confessed 
that he had sinned, and promised that if the thunderings 
and hail should be stopped he would let the people of 
Israel go. So they were stopped ; but the king's heart 
was again hardened, and he refused to let them go. And 
Moses went once more to Pharaoh, and said, — 



EMANCIPA TION. 2o i 

" Thus saith Jehovah God of the Hebrews, How long wilt thou refuse to 
humble thyself before me ? Let my people go, that they may serve me. 
Else, if thou refuse to let my people go, behold, to-morrow will I bring the 
locusts into thy coast : " 

and he described the plague that should be, and went out 
from Pharaoh. 

"And Pharaoh's servants said unto him, How long shall this man be a 
snare unto us ? let the men go, that they may serve Jehovah their God : 
knowest thou not yet that Egypt is destroyed t And Moses and Aaron were 
brought again unto Pharaoh : and he said unto them. Go, serve Jehovah 
your God: but who are they that shall go ? And Moses said, We will go 
with our young and with our old, with our sons and with our daughters, 
with our f]ocks and with our herds will we go; for we must hold a feast 
unto Jehovah. And he said unto them. Let Jehovah be so with you, as I 
will let you go, and your little ones : look to it ; for evil is before you. 
Not so : go now ye that are men, and serve the Lord ; for that ye did 
desire. And they were driven out from Pharaoh's presence. 

"And the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine hand over the land of 
Egvpt for the locusts, that they may come up upon the land of Egypt, and 
eat every herb of the land, even all that the hail hath left. And Moses 
stretched forth his rod over the land of Egypt, and the Lord brought an 
east wind upon the land all that day, and all that night; and when it was 
morning, the east wind brought the locusts. And the locusts went up over 
all the land of Egypt, and rested in all the coasts of Egypt : very grievous 
were they ; before them there were no such locusts as they, neither after 
them shall be such. For they covered the face of the whole earth, so that 
the land was darkened ; and they did eat every herb of the land, and all 
the fruit of the trees which the hail had left : and there remained not any 
green thing in the trees, or in the herbs of the field, through all the land of 
Egypt. 

" Then Pharaoh called for Moses and Aaron in haste; and he said, I 
have sinned against Jehovah your God, and against you. Now therefore 
forgive, I pray thee, my sin only this once, and intreat Jehovah your God, 
that he may take away from me this death only. And he went out from 
Pharaoh, and intreated the Lord. And the Lord turned a mighty strong 
west wind, which took away the locusts, and cast them into the Red Sea ; 
there remained not one locust in all the coasts of Egypt. 

" But the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the 
children of Israel go. And the Lord said unto Moses, Stretch out thine 
hand toward heaven, that there may be darkness over the land of Egypt, 
even darkness which may be felt. And Moses stretched forth his hand 
toward heaven ; and there was a thick darkness in all the land of Egypt 
three days : they saw not one another, neither rose any from his place for 
three days : but all the children of Israel had light in their dwellings. And 
Pharaoh called unto Moses, and said, Go ye, serve Jehovah ; only let your 



202 BIBLE STUDIES. 

flocks and your herds be stayed : let your little ones also go with you. And 
Moses said, Thou must give us also sacrifices and burnt offerings, that we 
may sacrifice unto the Lord our God. Our cattle also shall go with us ; 
there shall not an hoof be left behind ; for thereof must we take to serve 
Jehovah our God ; and we know not with what we must serve Jehovah, 
until we come thither. But the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he 
Avould not let them go. And Pharaoh said unto him, Get thee from me, 
take heed to thyself, see my face no more ; for in that day thou seest my 
face thou shalt die. 

"And Moses said, Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face again no 
more." 

Then a great plague was declared. The firstborn of 
every household in Egypt was to be stricken with death 
at the midnight hour, and it was this, as the most mem- 
orable event of their experience, that was to be handed 
down through all generations as a token of the power 
of God over his people. It was for this sake that the 
Feast of the Passover was then instituted, of which an 
account is given. The children of Israel were commanded 
to take lambs, preparing them in a certain way for eating, 
and they were to take hyssop branches, and with the blood 
of the lambs they were to smite the lintels of the doors and 
posts, that the destroying angel might pass by, — blood, 
among all ancient nations, being the symbol of life. 
Thus all the Israelites were protected. 

And then, at midnight, the scourge came, and there was 
not a house in all the city, nor in all the suburbs, nor in all 
the villages, nor along the line of the great river, far and 
wide, that there was not lamentation, and the cr}^, " Death, 
Death is here ! " Thereupon, — 

" Pharaoh rose up in the night, he, and all his servants, and all the Egyp- 
tians ; and there was a great cry in Egypt ; for there was not a house where 
there was not one dead." . 

The whole people moved, that time, and were urgent 
upon the Israelites to send them out of the land in haste. 
So the Hebrews made their march. And what a march, 
without organization, it must have been ! At any rate, they 
went forth, pursuing an eastward course. Instead of mak- 
ing directly for Canaan, the promised land, where it would 



EMANCIPA TION: 2oj 

have been necessary for them to meet a warlike people in 
fortified cities, they turned somewhat from the east to- 
ward the south, and came to the head of the Red Sea. 
There they found themselves surrounded on either side by 
mountains, with an arm of the sea before them. Pharaoh, 
having recovered sufficiently from the shock of the last 
plague which had been sent upon the Egyptians, had sent 
forth his army, and was pursuing them ; and the Israelites 
cried out, charging Moses with having brought them out 
of Egypt that they might be destroyed in the w^ilderness. 

But the Word of the Lord came unto Moses, saying, 
"Speak unto the children of Israel that t\\Q.y go forward.'' 
According to the divine command Moses stretched his hand 
over the sea, and God, by a strong east wind, laid bare the 
sands, so that the fugitive throng passed on across, and 
landed upon the other side. Pharaoh's host followed 
after them. The force that had rolled back the waves was 
by the divine command suspended, and the waters returned 
and whelmed the Egyptians, and they were destroyed. 

Here we leave the narrative, and, looking upon the far 
shore, in that motley crowd we behold two figures — Miriam 
and Moses — sister and brother. 

"Then sang Moses and the children of Israel this song unto the Lord, 
and spake, saying, — 

" I will sing unto the Lord, for he hath triumphed gloriously : 
The horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea," 

This sublime tragedy thus ends, not with the lurid light 
of the plagues that fell upon the obstinate monarch of 
Egypt ; nor does it end, to our imagination, with the irreg- 
ular movement of that great mob of Israelitish people : we 
have in our thought that people, brought out by a powerful 
hand and a stretched-out arm into a land of freedom, and 
behold them lingering upon the shore of the Red Sea, 
across which they have been so miraculously led, singing 
songs of triumph and joy and praise to Jehovah. 

So, the mighty drama is accomplished. The name of 
one God, and only one, has been celebrated by mighty acts 
and wonderful judgments. The obstinacy of despotism 



204 BIBLE STUDIES. 

has been beaten down. Emancipation has been declared, 
and is on the way toward realization. 

If you regard this as history, it is memorable history. 
If you consider it as history couched in the form of mag- 
nificent drama, there is no other like it. There is no other 
drama that attempts to deal with the might}^ theme of 
the breaking loose of a great people from an iron hand. 
There is no other drama whose actors are so sublime — 
whose heroes or prophets act, from day to day, under the 
inspiration of God himself. The heavens and the earth ; 
the forces of nature ; all the elements which men have 
been accustomed to regard as powers, — all of these are 
brought into play in this wonderful picture ; and out of 
their desolate and abandoned condition this great nation, 
by the hand of their fathers' God, were transplanted into 
the school of the desert and the wilderness. 

Our next discourse in this series will be a brief rehearsal 
of their passage from the side of the Red Sea to the banks 
of the Jordan ; and after that I shall undertake, if life and 
strength permit, a still more difficult task — namely, that of 
presenting the constitution which Moses framed for the 
education and government of that people. Our own con- 
stitution is one of the posterity of that of the wilderness. 
The timber that has been wrought into the fabric of this 
great nation was grown in the desert of Arabia, and the 
architect of the structure under whose roof w^e ourselves 
dwell was Moses — the greatest name of antiquity. If you 
take into consideration the various departments in which 
he served, if you bear in mind his prophetic gifts, his 
leadership and generalship, his constructive power in legis- 
lation, his administrative talent, his literary and poetic 
endowments, his is the greatest name — except the Name 
which is above every name — that ever dwelt upon the 
earth. 



XI. 
THE WILDERNESS AND SINAI. 



"And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee 
these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to 
know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his command- 
ments, or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee 
with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he 
might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every 
word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live." 



Last Sabbath night we dropped the history of the Israel- 
ites in their hour of triumph, upon the eastern shore of the 
western branch of the Red Sea, or the Gulf of Suez. At 
last Egypt was behind them. Their bondage was over. 
A new life was opening to them. It was but a little more 
than one hundred miles to the land that God had sworn 
to give to their fathers — Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and 
the twelve tribes ; and the way was not difficult. It was 
the way of the caravans, over which almost all the com- 
merce between the plain of Heliopolis, or what was the 
easterly part of the land of Goshen, and the southern part 
of Palestine, was carried on. Instead of following this road, 
Moses went three days into the wilderness ; then he turned 
southward ; and it was fortyyears before the tribes took 
possession of the promised land. 

The question arises, Why should this have been ? Why 
was not the ordinary path taken ? If it be replied that there 
were necessities of discipline, as I shall show in a moment, 
it may be asked. Since God was in the way of working 
miracles, why did he not work a comprehensive miracle at 
this time ? Why did he not inspire the people with miracu- 



2o6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

lous courage ? Why did he not disregard the Hivites, the 
Jebusites, and all the other ites^ and let the people go at 
once into the promised land ? 

There were two reasons that I think will be obvious 
upon their being unfolded. In regard, first, to this working 
of miracles, neither then nor since — that is, neither in the 
Old Testament dispensation nor in the New — were miracles 
wrought for the sake of working them, nor for the sake of 
avoiding natural difficulties. They did not undertake to 
substitute divine omnipotence for human will, education, 
and faith. They were auxiliary, occasional ; and they 
were always wrought, not for the purpose of relieving men 
from special personal troubles, but for the purpose of in- 
spiring men that were rude and unenlightened with the 
highest conception of God, the Invisible — for the purpose 
of bringing down to human comprehension the fact that 
God maintained providence, ruled in heaven, and con- 
trolled natural law. In so far as it was necessary to fill 
the imagination with this sense of God, so far miracles be- 
came a part of the education of the people ; but to go on 
with them, and take away all motive for exertion or cour- 
age or learning by making everything miraculously easy 
would have been to have reared idiots and not men. 

The reason, then, why the direct path was not taken to 
Palestine was, first, a military one. It is true that the Israel- 
ites had men of war among them ; it is true that it was 
the policy of Pharaoh to make these men defenders of the 
frontier, and along the line that separated the cultivated 
portion of Goshen from the wilderness (it should be called 
a wilderness, and not a desert) beyond. Along the line 
where he might fear the incursions of wandering tribes 
or great peoples — there, by policy, he encouraged military 
development. So, when the Israelites went out they were 
not to go devoid of experience in warfare, or of brave men, 
as we shall have occasion to show. Nevertheless, if there 
were a million or a million and a half (I should rather take 
the lower figure than the higher ; because we are not alto- 
gether acquainted with enumeration as it existed at that 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAL 207 

time, and the tendency is to exaggerate numbers) thai 
was a large band to move. There is nothing else in history 
like it. The only thing that approaches it is the accoui.t 
by De Ouincey of the uprooting of the great Tartar tribe 
from the midst of Russia, and its march across the conti- 
nent back again to the borders of China, the land of its 
fathers ; and that was a horrible experience. There is not 
in any literature a more wonderful delineation of such a 
scene than that given by De Quincey. But this journey of 
the people of Israel was more methodical. It was like tak- 
ing a great nation out of a fat valley, where they were 
slaves and idolaters, and setting them down in a hard 
pasturage country, where they were to be pupils. It was 
the School of the Wilderness to which they were going 
They were to become scholars. 

It is probable that they did not advance more than ten 
miles a day. The women and children and flocks certainly 
could not have been moved faster than that. If they had 
crossed the southern borders of Palestine they would easily 
have been attacked in the front and flank by those who had 
possession of the land, whose business was warfare, and 
who were armed and always ready ; so that the greatest 
disasters would have come to them. They were therefore 
turned away from the northern route to the east and south. 

For another reason they were put through this passage 
of the wilderness. They were not fit for settlement in Pal- 
estine : they were as little fit for it as they were for fight- 
ing their way directly to it. 

You will take notice that in our text the reason given for 
their carriage through the wilderness is that they might be 
educated — for that is the real meaning of the statement. 

" Thou shalt remember all the way which Jehovah thy God led thee these 
forty years [this was after it was all over] in the wilderness, to humble thee 
and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest 
keep his commandments, or no." 

They were going into a state of discipline, of schooling, 
that they might develop the moral, social, and civil quali- 
ties necessary for a permanent nationality. 



2o8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with 
manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know ; that he 
might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every 
word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Ilord doth man live." 

They were to understand that God was the only true 
end of the highest manhood ; and that they might develop 
this higher manhood in the center of the wilderness. For 
such a purpose as that the wilderness certainly was good. 
If the people were to be nationalized, if they were not to 
be scattered into alliances on the right and on the left, it 
was desirable that they should have their training in the 
wilderness, where they would be little liable to attack. 
They were to be compacted ; they were to be brought into 
obedience ; they were to have institutions ; they were to 
be educated in laws and customs ; and above all they were 
to have a spiritual religion opened up before them, with its 
truths and inspirations. 

This was an immense undertaking. It was one of the 
most gigantic conceptions that ever entered into the heart 
of man — that of bringing a great people out from the midst 
of the most powerful military nation on the globe, taking 
them into a wilderness, where there were no cities, no vil- 
lages, no industrial developments of any kind, and there 
drilling them as soldiers, breaking them in as citizens, reg- 
ulating their habits, and inspiring in them an esprit de 
corps., a national spirit of patriotism, that should hold them 
together ; and doing these things chiefly by unfolding in 
them the idea of a pure theocracy, of only one God, hold- 
ing in his hands the heaven above, the earth beneath, and 
all laws and influences. 

To them the word law, as applied in the modern sense of 
the methods in which God's forces act, would mean noth- 
ing. It was long before the development of that theory in 
the human race What we call natural laws were not 
known for thousands of years after that time. Instead of 
the modern scientific knowledge of the method of God in 
the administration of his power through great natural 
agencies, it was indispensable that a ruder government 



THE WILDERNESS AXD SINAI. 209 

should be resorted to ; and that ruder government was an 
impression upon their imagination that all the great ele- 
ments of nature were, at one time or another, under the 
control — before their eyes, they being witnesses — of the 
God of Moses, — the invisible God, whom it was impossible 
to represent by picture or carved statue. A great nation, 
besotted, servile, could not have been taken and made to 
serve an invisible God, in Egypt, and along the valley of 
the Nile, where they had been used to seeing gods in ani- 
mals and images and symbols on every side, and would 
have been subjected to the attack and solicitation of neigh- 
boring nations with their idolatrous tendencies. 

There is one thought that may perhaps be of service here. 
That was a time in the history of the Israelites when their 
minds were not unfolded to the simplest ideas above ma- 
terial fact ; but now there has developed a divine economy 
by which even rude and coarse natures in almost all 
nations are brought into a fuller understanding of the 
divine nature. The truth comes in here which I mentioned 
in my second lecture — namely, that inspiration, or revela- 
tion, is limited by the receiving power of those to whom it 
is made, and that it is impossible to disclose any more of 
unseen truth than is within the capacity of the men to 
w^hom it is given to comprehend. All the world may be 
full of sunshine ; but if the roof be slate, and the windows 
be covered, and the doors be closed, there can be no sun- 
shine in the house. There is darkness there. There can 
be in any structure no more of the light of the continental, 
atmospheric sun than can pass through the aperture by 
which it is admitted. And in dealing with the primitive 
races the divine interference was adapted not only to the 
wants of men, but to their ability to appropriate what they 
received. For those early ages would naturally be insti- 
tuted an economy that to us would be full of strange lights 
and shadows. More advanced methods, that would be 
entirely understandable to you, would not have been 
understood by men who lived in the time of Moses. You 
can well see that what in the olden time was considered 
14 



21 o BIBLE STUDIES. 

manly wisdom is like nursery talk of later generations. The 
attempt to put into the minds of children ideas which they 
have had no experience to enable them to grasp, would be 
futile. How often the mother is obliged to say to the 
child, when it desires information on subjects that are 
above its comprehension, "Wait, my darling, till you are 
older, and then you will understand these things." 

The problem of the instruction of the Israelites in the 
wilderness, then, was the problem of the nursery. It was 
like undertaking to put knowledge into the mind of an 
unknowing child. And if sometimes there seems to be a 
strange use of natural causes, and at times an abandon- 
ment of them, much must be attributed to our ignorance 
in the divine adaptation of means to ends ; to the fact that 
in the early period of the human race there were obtuse- 
nesses of which we can form scarcely any conception, and 
which required striking methods to arouse the sluggish 
mentality below. 

Another thing : when you think of the children of Israel 
as being in a "wilderness," you must not imagine that it 
was a desert, or such a wilderness as that west of Egypt, 
where sand hills roll as waves of the ocean. Far from it. 
Modern travelers say that there are but one or two places 
in the Sinaitic Peninsula where sand prevails, and that for 
the most part there is a rock formation there. The penin- 
sula, or portion of the country inclosed between the out- 
stretched arms of the Red Sea, is not, in shape, unlike a 
horse-shoe, bent out a little ; and the central part of it is 
rocky upland. The lower section is mountainous. Be- 
tween the mountains run sinuous valleys, not altogether 
barren, and yet not fertile like our western valleys, but, 
with their water courses, affording a very fair sustenance 
for herds, for flocks of sheep, and for goats. Here and 
there was an oasis on which grass and shrubs and herbs 
grew ; and the Israelites went forth with large flocks and 
herds ; and as they traveled from place to place, pasturing 
their animals as they went, much of their subsistence con- 
sisted of milk. 



THE WILDERNESS AXD SINAI. 21 1 

It is probable that in the ancient day there was far bet- 
ter herbage in that region than there is now. We know 
that in Palestine, for instance, in the time of the Old Testa- 
ment Scripture, it was clothed with forests, while to-day 
there is not in all of Palestine a good-sized tree. For pur- 
poses of war, or other uses, the growth has been almost 
entirely cut away. Although there may be new growths 
coming afterward, especially on the part east of the Jordan, 
other portions have been denuded to such an extent that 
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob would not enter them. If 
they came to them and looked at them, they would pass 
them by. The same causes have laid bare the Sinaitic 
wilderness. There were formerly more trees, shrubs, under- 
growth, and grasses there than there are to-day. 

Looking, then, upon the mission of Moses, and his pur- 
pose to inform and train this horde of degraded slaves into 
a great nation, and looking upon this rocky and pastoral 
wilderness as a schoolhouse, let us follow them on their 
way to school. 

First, we shall notice the three murmurings with which 
this part of their history opens. 

" So Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea, and they went out into the 
wilderness of Shur ; and they went three days in the wilderness, and found 
no water. And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the 
waters of Marah, for they were bitter." 

Probably they were alkaline. 

"And the people murmured against Moses [of course against Moses — on 
the leader of any people come all the complaints], saying, What shall we 
drink? And he cried unto the Lord; and the Lord showed him a tree, 
which when he had cast into the waters the waters were made sweet : there 
he made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there he proved them, 
and said, If thou wilt diligently hearken to the voice of Jehovah thy God, 
and wilt do that which is right in his sight, and wilt give ear to his com- 
mandments, and keep all his statutes, I will put none of these diseases upon 
thee, which I have brought upon the Egyptians : for I am Jehovah that 
healeth thee." 

Does anyone say that to work a miracle and sweeten a 
bitter spring is scarcely worthy of God, who is the governor 
of the processes of the natural world ? But was it not 



212 BIBLE STUDIES. 

worthy of Moses, the schoolmaster of a nation, was it not 
wise in him, when he desired to impress upon them the 
reality of the divine presence and power in every natural 
agency, to take an occasion like this to bring to bear 
upon the imagination and conviction of this great people 
the fact that God had sweetened these waters right before 
their eyes, and incline them to believe, and to say, " There 
is a God, an invisible Ruler, in the heaven " ? 

"And they came to Elim, where were twelve wells of water, and three- 
score and ten palm trees [this gathermg of palm trees remams, and has in- 
creased to the number of some two thousand, we are told]. And they 
encamped there by the waters. And they took their journey from Elim, 
and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness 
of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second 
month after their departing out of the land of Egypt. 

"And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against 
Moses and Aaron in the wilderness : and the children of Israel said unto 
them. Would to God we had died by the hand of Jehovah in the land of 
Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the 
full ; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole 
assembly with hunger." 

There you get the level of this people. The moment 
they were thirsty life was nothing, heroism was nothing, 
and religion was nothing, to them. The moment they were 
hungry there was nothing else in all the world, to their 
minds, but food. They lived for the belly. 

" Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven 
for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, 
that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no. And it 
shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they 
bring in ; and it shall be twice as much as they gather daily. And Moses and 
Aaron said unto all the children of Israel, At even, then ye shall know that 
Jehovah hath brought you out from the land of Egypt : and in the morning, 
then ye shall see the glory of Jehovah ; for that he heareth your murmur- 
ings against Jehovah : and what are we, that ye murmur against us ? " 

It was as if they had said, '' It is not our power or skill, 
but God, that is leading you." 

"And Moses said, This shall be, when Jehovah shall give you in the even- 
ing flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full ; for that Jehovah 
heareth your murmurings which ye murmur against him: and what are we ? 
Your murmurings are not against us, but against Jehovah. And Moses 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAL ^13 

spake unto Aaron, Say unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, 
Come near before the Lord : for he hath heard your murmurings. And it 
came to jDass as Aaron spake unto the whole congregation of the children 
of Israel, that they looked toward the wilderness, and, behold, the glory of 
Jehovah appeared in the cloud [some light, some image, some illumina- 
tion]. And Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, I have heard the murmur- 
ingS of the children of Israel : speak unto them, saying. At even ye shall eat 
flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread; and ye shall know 
that I am the Lord your God." 

It was right to feed them, that they might know the 
reality of God, and of his presence with them. 

"And it came to pass, that at even the quails came up, and covered the 
camp." 

It is not necessar}^ to suppose that in each case there 
was a turning aside from or overcoming of some known 
natural law, and introducing some natural law with which 
men were not before acquainted. Anything that is not un- 
derstood, and that excites wonder, is regarded as a miracle ; 
but that is not always true. This statement in regard to 
the quails is said to accord with a historical fact recurring 
to this day. We are told that they sometimes came in 
flocks that almost darkened the sun at certain periods ; and 
very likely the account here given may have related to one 
of those instances. Whether it did or not, whether or not 
Moses' long years of familiarity in all this region gave him 
knowledge of such exceptional resources, whether the cir- 
cumstance occurred first at that time or not, its coming at 
that time marked it to them as a divine interference. 

Then came, the next morning, the miracle of the manna, 

"And in the morning the dew lay round about the host. And when the 
dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there 
lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground. And 
when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another. It is manna : 
for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them. This is the 
bread which the Lord hath given you to eat." 

I have been reading, this week, a long line of discussions 
on the part of men who want to show that what was called 
" manna " was an exudation from the acacia tree. They 
want to get around the miracle. I do not propose to get 
around it in any way, so long as there is no other solution 



214 BIBLE STUDIES. 

than that of the statement here. You have got either to 
jump this statement or take it. There is no getting around 
it or modifying it. 

You will take notice that there fell enough manna to 
feed about fifteen hundred thousand people. There must 
have been a good many acacia bushes to give out enough 
gum for the consumption of that number of people. They 
were to gather of this manna every morning on six days — 
an omer for every mouth. An omer is about three quarts ; 
so there were three quarts for each man, woman, and child. 
They gathered it every day, a quart for a meal. That was 
for 15read only. They were, of course, to have the nourish- 
ment which sprang from the flocks — the usual nourishment 
of wandering people. This continued during their whole 
stay in the regions of Sinai, Moab, and Kadesh, to Palestine ; 
but when they crossed the Jordan, and came to Gilgal, and 
found old corn, they began to eat that. Then, and only 
then, the manna was withheld from them. 

This is the statement ; and if you can make any natural 
explanation of it you are more ingenious than I am, or than 
I can conceive anybody to be. It is in accordance with the 
faith of the people at the time, and of the people that came 
after them. It has entered into Christian literature every- 
where, and Christian faith throughout the world. It is 
supposed that this manna fell down from heaven every 
morning. The falling down of manna every morning from 
heaven is very properly expressed, and likened to the 
down-coming of the divine influence upon our souls. The 
inspiration and the comfort of the Holy Ghost vouchsafed 
to men is represented, in the minds of men, by the descent 
of the manna to the people in the wilderness. 

On the Sabbath there was to be no gathering. The 
acacia bushes would not bear on the Sabbath ! On the 
day before they bore twice as much as on other week days, 
and the children of Israel were commanded to gather two 
omers ; and although on every other day this exudation, 
this manna, would keep only during twenty-four hours, 
that which they gathered on Friday kept all that day and 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAI. 215 

through tlie Sabbath. The amount of it, the continuance 
of it, and the peculiarities of its condition in their hands, 
all seem to lead to one single conclusion — either that the 
statement is absolute fiction or that it is a fact. If it is 
a fact it is a miracle, — and a most stupendous miracle. It 
stands over against the greatest miracle of Christ ; for you 
will recall that while raising the dead was in some respects 
to us among the most wonderful acts wrought by Christ, 
yet a greater act performed by him was the feeding of the 
five thousand by the multiplying of the loaf. When this 
latter miracle was wrought it produced such an effect on 
the imagination of the people that they declared that God 
had come, that here was a king, and that he should be 
crowned ; and they sought to take him by violence and 
compel him to lead them to glory and to victory. This 
sending of the manna was more impressive than the light 
that went by night and the cloud that went by day before 
the people of God. 

The next and third murmuring was for the same reason — 
the want of something to drink. 

"And all the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the 
wilderness of wSin, after their journeys, according to the commandment of 
the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim [the precise locality we cannot now de- 
termine], and there was no water for the people to drink. Wherefore the 
people did chide with Moses, and said. Give us water that we may drink. 
And Moses said unto them, Why chide ye with me ? wherefore do ye 
tempt Jehovah .? And the people thirsted there for water ; and the people 
murmured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast brought 
us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst 1 
And Moses cried unto Jehovah, saying. What shall I do unto this people ? 
they be almost ready to stone me." 

There never has been a king or president since that time 
who has not felt the same way. When anything goes 
wrong the people want to stone the leader or head of the 
party or nation. 

"And Jehovah said unto Moses, Go on before the people, and take with 
thee of the elders of Israel ; and thy rod, wherewith thou smotest the river, 
take in thine hand, and go. Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the 
rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water 
out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the 



2i6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place Massah [Tempting, or 
Proving], and Meribah [Chiding, or Strife], because of the chiding of the 
children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying, Is Jehovah 
among us, or not ? " 

That event lias wrought itself into the history of the 
world. The familiar and beautiful hymn — 

" Rock of ages, cleft for me, 
Let me hide myself in thee," 

had its origin in this scene. 

Again, then, the people were supplied with water by the 
miraculous interposition of God through his servant Moses. 

At this point the Israelites had their first conflict. Tid- 
ings came to them that a great people had broken into 
their pastoral grounds. Amalek had sent out couriers, 
gathered together a great army, and fallen upon the Israel- 
ites. By this time, doubtless, considerable order had been 
introduced into the camp of the children of Israel, and 
when Amalek attacked them they were not altogether 
unprepared for self-defense. Not much is told about the 
fighting ; but the same thought runs through this part of 
the history as through other portions — namely, that of the 
attempt to fasten the minds of these idolaters upon the 
sustaining power and protection of their invisible God. 
IMoses ascended a near hill, and stood as if imploring 
Jehovah, and as long as his hands were lifted up in an atti- 
tude of prayer, so long they made headway against the 
attacking tribe ; but as his hands grew weary and fell, the 
conflict wavered. It is probable that the people saw it, and 
that whenever his hands were lowered they lost courage, 
while when they were lifted up they were inspired with 
heroism. We know how a fighting body, by a wave either 
of panic or enthusiasm, can be driven forward or backward 
at a critical moment. So Aaron, and Hur (who is repre- 
sented to have been the husband of Miriam's sister), held up 
Moses' hands in prayer. This striking figure appears in 
literature the world over to express spiritual help given by 
men to one another. 

The Amalekites were utterly defeated by the Israelites 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAI. 2lJ 

under Joshua, who here first appears as a miUtary leader. 
Just why Moses promulgated a decree of extermination 
against these first attackers of the Israelites, in the name of 
Jehovah, does not appear : perhaps because of some pecul- 
iar cruelty in their attack. But he did ; and after the 
entrance into the promised land only a handful of the 
Amalekites remained. The decree uttered against them 
had been fulfilled. 

Now we come to the most significant experience in all 
the wanderings of the Israelites, It occurred around about 
Sinai, in the peninsula, in the third month after the exodus 
from Egypt. There has been much discussion in re- 
spect to this mountain. There is a cluster of mountains, 
much like our White Mountains in New Hampshire, with 
which you are familiar. There are eight or ten peaks in 
the White Mountain cluster. The highest. Mount Wash- 
ington, is well known. The question as to whether a par- 
ticular event took place on one or another peak of a cluster 
of mountains may not be very important ; and yet it may 
be exceedingly interesting. It is now pretty well accepted 
that Mount Sinai was located on the westward flank of this 
pile of rugged slopes. 

We are to bear in mind that those mountains are not 
simply craggy hills. Their height varies from five to nine 
thousand miles — feet, I mean ! I am not a worker of mira- 
cles, and therefore I correct myself, and reduce the quan- 
tity. Mount Washington is six thousand, three hundred 
feet high. The highest point in the Sinaitic group is be- 
tween nine and ten thousand feet high. Besides being 
rugged, they are gloomy and grand. The whole neighbor- 
hood is impressive. The peculiar character of the air 
about them is such that a person reading in a low tone can 
be distinctly heard at a distance of sixty feet. The Bedouin 
Arabs say they can hear across the whole sea of Achbor 
on the east. This is probably an exaggeration, but it has 
some foundation in fact. 

There is sufficient valley ground to accommodate the 
number of people that must have encamped there. If 



2i8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

modern investigation had shown that there was not room 
enough for all those people, it would have gone very much 
against the narrative ; but there is the ground, and there 
is the mountain standing over against it. These mountains 
had been visited by the Egyptians. Some of their carving 
on the rocks there remains to this day. 

The Israelites, then, after leaving Rephidim, came into 
the wilderness of Sinai, and were brought into this great 
camp-ground, in front of the mount, for the purpose of 
receiving the Word of God under conditions the most 
terrible and the most impressive. 

The preparation for this deserves a moment's attention. 
There is given in the nineteenth chapter a reason for it. 

"And Moses went up unto God, and the Lord called unto him out of the 
mountain, saying. Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the 
children of Israel : Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how 
I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now, there- 
fore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall 
be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people : for all the earth is mine : 
and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. These 
are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel." 

Here the drama of emancipation is enunciated as a pre- 
lude, and the purpose of what is to follow, which is a moral 
one of transcendent importance, is made known, Moses 
commanded all the people to prepare themselves, to wash 
their clothes, and to practice abstinence from ever3^thing 
that would give sensuousness to their life ; for on the third 
day Jehovah should be manifested to them upon the mount. 
Bounds were set about the sacred ground, and no man was 
to touch the mount on pain of death, nor to approach 
it. 

"And it came to pass on the third day in the morning, that there were 
thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount, and the voice 
of the trumpet exceeding loud ; so that all the people that was in the camp 
trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet 
with God ; and they stood at the nether part of the mount. And Mount 
Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because Jehovah descended upon it in 
fire : and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the 
whole mount [some ancient authorities make this people\ quaked greatly. 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAL 219 

And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and 
louder, Moses spake, and Jehovah answered him by a voice." 

Compare the majesty and magnificence of this with all 
those scenes of the appearance of the gods that are men- 
tioned in the Greek and Egyptian mythologies, and that 
were conceived of by the Romans. It stands without a 
parallel or an approach in any ancient descriptions of the 
appearance of God, and is worthy of the glory that has 
been ascribed to him. 

"And the Lord came down upon Mount Sinai, on the top of the mount : 
and the Lord called Moses up to the top of the mount ; and Moses went up. 
And the Lord said unto Moses, Go down, charge the people, lest they break 
through unto the Lord to gaze, and many of them perish. And let the 
priests also, w^hich come near to the Lord, sanctify themselves, lest the Lord 
break forth upon them. And Moses said unto the Lord, The people can- 
not come up to Mount Sinai : for thou chargedst us, saying. Set bounds 
about the mount, and sanctify it." 

They were to inspire the whole multitude with the pro- 
foundest awe and reverence, as in the very presence of their 
God. 

"And the Lord said unto Moses, Thou shalt come up, thou, and Aaron 
wath thee : but let not the priests and people come up." 

"And God spake all these words, saying, I am Jehovah thy God, which 
have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 

"Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 

" Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of 
anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is 
in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor 
serve them : for I Jehovah thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity 
of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of 
them that hate me ; and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love 
me, and keep my commandments. 

" Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain ; for Jehovah 
will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. 

" Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Si.x days shalt thou labor, 
and do all thy work : but the seventh day is the Sabbath of Jehovah thy 
God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy 
manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is 
within thy gates : for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, 
and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day : wherefore Jehovah 
blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it. 

" Honor thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long upon the 
land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee. 



220 . BIBLE STUDIES. 

" Thou shalt not kill. 

" Thou shalt not commit adultery. 

" Thou shalt not steal. 

" Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. 

" Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house,* thou shalt not covet thy 
neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor 
his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's." 

Moses abode in the mount, it is said, for forty days, re- 
ceiving from God the whole form of service, and the whole 
so-called Levitical economy, to which, to a very large ex- 
tent, the remainder of this book and the whole of the book 
of Leviticus are devoted. While he was in the mountain an 
extraordinary scene took place. I shall return to the Ten 
Commandments after I have finished the story. 

It seems that during the long absence of Moses the peo- 
ple forgot their terror and their trembling, and, being 
released from the master-eye and the master-mind, began 
to fall back into the habits they had brought up with them 
from Egypt. They demanded of Aaron that he should make 
them a graven image of a god such as they had probably 
worshiped in Egypt, and he did so, making a golden calf, 
or bull — the Egyptian emblem of creative power — which 
they worshiped with great turbulence and noise. 

"And Moses turned, and went down from the mount, and the two tables 
of the testimony were in his hand : the tables were written on both their 
sides ; on the one side and on the other were they written. And the tables 
were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven 
upon the tables. And when Joshua heard the noise of the people as they 
shouted, he said unto Moses, There is a noise of war in the camp. And he 
said. It is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the 
voice of them that cry for being overcome : but the noise of them that sing 
do I hear. And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, 
that he saw the calf, and the dancing : and Moses' anger waxed hot." 

No wonder ! 

"And he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the 
mount." 

It is not likely that he meant to break them, but they 
broke. Probably they were slabs of granite, thin but heavy ; 
and in the impetuosity of his nature, during an outburst 
of that same fiery indignation which led him to slay the 



THE WILDERNESS AND SE\AI. 221 

Egyptian, under the influence of his rash temper, largely 
subdued, like coals raked up, dangerous, ready to flame 
forth, he cast the tables out of his hands, and broke them. 

"And he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire, and 
ground it to powder, and strawed it upon the water, and made the children 
of Israel drink of it. And Moses said unto Aaron, What did this people 
unto thee, that thou hast brought so great a sin upon them ? And Aaron 
said. Let not the anger of my lord wax hot : thou knowest the people, that 
they are set on mischief. For they said unto me. Make us gods, which 
shall go before us : for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out 
of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him. And I said unto 
them, Whosoever hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave it me : 
then I cast it into the fire, and there came out this calf." 

Fool ! What a coward, what a liar, what a wretch, shirk- 
ing all the blame from himself, and making up this miser- 
able story ! If a man will lie, he ought to lie somewhere 
along the border of the probable truth ! 

Then followed a scene of judgment most terrible : — 

" Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Who is on the Lord's 
side ? let him come unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves 
together unto him. And he said unto them, Thus saith Jehovah, God of 
Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from gate to 
gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother, and every man 
his companion, and every man his neighbor. And the children of Levi did 
according to the word of Moses: and there fell of the people that day about 
three thousand men." 

It was a time for surgery. This was a condition of things 
in which the whole scene of emancipation was likely to 
fall to the ground, and the grand experiment of education 
was in danger of ignominiously coming to naught ; there 
must be some punishment which should strike the people 
with such terror and remorse as to bring to an end their 
defection. After having been, by Almighty God, rescued 
from the terrible plagues of Egypt ; after having been, by 
the divine hand, borne across the sea, and through the wil- 
derness, as on eagles' wings ; after having been again and 
again supplied with food and water ; after having been 
brought through scenes of terror to Mount Sinai, where 
most majestic and dramatic effects were produced upon 
them — after all these things, within the space of forty days, 



222 BIBLE STUDIES. 

being left without a leader, they came down to what 
among more cultivated people, in later days, was called the 
worship of Venus. They were debauched. They were en- 
gaged in that which was worse than a drunken frolic. They 
were guilty of a heinous sin toward God. And when Moses 
visited them with such punishment as it is recorded that 
he did, it indicated a determination to produce upon them 
a wholesome and lasting moral impression. 

I come back, now, for a moment, to a rendering of the 
Decalogue — the Ten Words — the Ten Commandments. 
These Commandments may be called the constitution of 
the Jewish people. Though there is chapter after chapter 
of directions concerning worship and civil economy, — for 
the Mosaic system included the total knowledge of civility, 
— the Ten Commandments were the marrow and center of 
that system ; and they indicated that which was peculiar 
to the early period in which they were given, not by what 
they contained, so much as by what they omitted. 

The Ten Commandments must underlie civilization to 
the end of the world — for there is in them something more 
fundamental than that which rests upon physical elements. 
The union of morality with spiritual religion was first made 
known here. It was here that man's duty toward God was 
first coupled with his duty toward men — for religion is the 
worship of God, and morality is the discharge of our duties 
toward our fellows ; and here, first, in the history of litera- 
ture, we find them joined together and forming one system. 
Their separation was the curse of all the other religious 
systems in the world. All other religions had in them 
worship, but not morality ; here we find them united. 

In the first place, standing above every other declaration 
is that of the unity of God ; and the natural inference to 
be drawn from it is the denunciation of all forms of idola- 
try. The foremost conception was that of establishing a 
power in the minds of the people by unfolding to them the 
nature of God, and bringing them to believe that he gov- 
erned the heavens and the earth, and that they were his 
peculiar people, 



THE WILDERNESS AND SEVAI. 223 

So, here, declaration is made of God ; and it is remark- 
able that at so early a period the monotheistic idea, or the 
idea of the eternal unity of God, was developed in so clear 
and distinct a form. It was taught that there was one 
God, and only one ; and that has been the salvation of re- 
ligion through the ages. 

' What is still more striking, is, in the second Command- 
ment, that God was to be forever to them an idea — a crea- 
ture of the imagination. He was not to be represented to 
them by any outline of chalk or charcoal, nor by any pic- 
ture or statue. He was not to be limned or carved. Noth- 
ing in the heavens — no brilliant star and no radiant sun — 
was to represent him. No phenomenal representation was 
to be made of him. Nothing on the earth or in the water, 
was to portray him. No sensuous and physical thing, 
should delineate him. The Infinite is boundless, and can- 
not be described by means of art or any outward object. 
In the forefront stands the Invisible and Indescribable, so 
vast that nothing in this world can represent it. The con- 
ception is a majestic one. And that is the purport of the 
first two Commandments ; it will endure throughout the 
ages. 

" Thou shalt not take the name of Jehovah thy God in vain ; for Jehovah 
will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." 

Irreverence for sacred things ; playing the animal with 
supreme things ; the degradation of things higher than 
ordinary life, which should lead men up from the depths of 
lower experience, — that is accursed.. To go through a gal- 
lery of art, and slime the noblest pictures with mud, and 
deface or destroy the most magnificent marbles, — no man 
would permit that. The whole world would cry out 
against the desecration of beauty under such circumstances. 
Yet men think themselves justified in drawing down the 
sanctities of heaven, — those thoughts and feelings which 
have in them inspiration and elevation, — and defiling them, 
or using them for purposes of self-aggrandizement and low 
ambition ; while here stands this command, which covers 
the whole ground of vulgarizing things that are high, and 



224 BIBLE STUDIES. 

that are necessary to lift men up from low associations. 
" Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in 
vain " does not mean simply that men shall not curse, or 
even swear by that holy name to falsehood ; it includes the 
whole latitude and longitude of the realm of thought and 
feeling in which there is the desecration of whatever is 
sacred. 

" Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou 
labor, and do all thy work : but the seventh day is the Sabbath of Jehovah 
thy God : in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy 
daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy 
stranger that is within thy gates." 

This commandment is an enunciation of the great law of 
humanity. It enjoins rest. Men are called upon to rest 
one day out of every seven. It is not a proscription of en- 
joyment or of social delight. It was not so carried out in 
the Jewish nation as to exclude these things ; on the con- 
trary, it markedly included them. It merely says '^ Stop," 
to the plough. It says to the toiling yoke and to all tools, 
"Be still." It says to labor of every kind, "Cease." Its 
object is to give a pause : for sanctuary privileges, for 
instruction and reflection, for enjoyment, — in a word, for 
recreation. It is one of the most blessed provisions that 
ever came to the world. It stands, to-day, not on the 
ground of Levitical observance, but on the ground of uni- 
versal humanity. The command is, " Rest," because the 
laboring race need rest ; and woe be to those industries 
and vocations that keep men toiling seven days every 
week in a ceaseless round, and give them no rest! Every 
man has a right to his seventh day of rest, everywhere, for 
purposes of joy, for purposes of society, and for purposes 
of moral culture ; and this will stand to the end of time. 

Next to the worship of God is reverence for parents ; 
this is the foundation of the family. 

" Honor thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long upon the 
land which Jehovah thy God giveth thee." 

There is no people who verify that more than the Jews. 
They are remarkable for sweetness and beauty of domes- 



THE WILDERNESS AND SINAI. 225 

tic life, and for health and length of days. To this hour, 
through all their medieval persecutions, in spite of all the 
horrible cruelty to which they have been subjected, they 
have been marked as a people of wonderful endurance and 
elasticity. Their life began in the household. The com- 
mand, " Honor thy father and thy mother," has not been 
so implicitly obeyed in any other nation as among the 
Israelites ; and in no other nation has been so signally 
realized the implied promise, " that thy days may be long 
in the land." As a nation, in spite of multiform adversity 
they have had notable prosperity, and you may depend 
upon it that in a country where the household is pure, and 
the father and mother are reverenced, there are laid foun- 
dations which revolution itself cannot destroy, and which 
no outward adversity can overthrow. The sanctuary of 
the household is in importance above every other thing. 

Then comes the conflict in the relations of men. 

" Thou shalt not kill," 

That is a declaration of the sacredness of human life. 
" Thou shalt not commit adultery." 

Here the purity of the household is made the subject 
of a distinct command. 

"Thou shalt not steal." 

The sanctity of property is thus enunciated. The 
heathen doubtless in all ages have needed this injunction ; 
and it is an injunction aimed at a socialistic abomination 
which prevails to-day. The results of a man's productive 
powder are not to be taken from him without a suitable 
equivalent. Thou shalt not unjustly take from another 
that which he earns. The sacredness of property is the 
very foundation of civil society. 

" Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor " — 
unless he is a politician, or a governor, or a candidate, or a 
president ! But here it is put without exception. Thou 
shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor; and you are 
not excused from obeying this command even if you are 
the editor of a religious paper. Nor are you excused from 
15 



226 BIBLE STUDIES. 

it because a man belongs to a different sect from that to 
which you belong, or because he is in a rival business, or 
because he stands over against you in the conflicts of life. 
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor 
either by your tongue or by your ear. It is as bad for a 
man to quietly hear another man slandered as to slander 
him. 

And, brethren, it is not enough for you to maintain in 
your speech and in your whole conduct the sanctity of the 
reputation of those around about you. There is a phase 
of honor far more sacred than that. There is in every man 
a silent judgment-seat, a chamber in his own thoughts, 
where he thinks evil or thinks well of his neighbors ; where 
he looks upon them charitably or uncharitably ; and you 
are violating one of the sanctities of God's Law when you 
dare to think unjustly of your fellow men. They are not 
present to hear your charge or to defend themselves against 
it ; and if you condemn them, you condemn them unseen 
and unheard. In the silence of your thoughts you inflict 
the grossest injustice upon them. Every man who has the 
spirit of Christ, and professes to exemplify that spirit, is 
bound not only to abstain from outward misrepresentation 
and adverse criticism of men, as commanded by Moses, but 
to see to it that in his own thoughts men have justice done 
them. 

" Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, thou shalt not covet thy 
neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor 
his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's." 

Envy, jealousy, and hunger for another's prosperity — 
these are a violation of the central canon of benevolence, 
and are forbidden. 

Here, then, are the foundations of religion : in reverence 
toward God, in the sanctity of the household, in the sacred- 
ness of property, in a just conduct of mutual relations and 
intercourse of one with another. They are the foundation 
of worship within the bounds of civil society. What was 
lacking in these declarations of the early period were the 
elements of meekness, of self-denial, of love, and of self- 



THE WILDERXESS AND SINAI. 227 

sacrifice. These had not then been developed. They are 
fruits of the later econom)^ set forth in the Sermon on the 
Mount. In the Ten Commandments we have the founda- 
tion, and in the Sermon on the Mount we have the super- 
structure. The Ten Commandments wdll always be needed 
because there will always be men in the wilderness ; there 
will always be a detritus ; there will always be a vast 
amount of barbarism and heathenism. In every genera- 
tion the Ten Commandments will be as much wanted as 
ever they were. But they are not enough. They stand as 
the Law in respect to the lower forms of life. The higher 
forms — the graces, the effluences, the blossom, the fruit, the 
beauty of transcendent spirituality — these Christ came to 
develop, and they must be superadded to the Ten Com- 
mandments in order to make a complete whole, and thus 
will the Law be ^^ fulfilled." 

I shall close with only one reading, and that from the 
Twelfth Chapter of Hebrews, that I may put it in apposi- 
tion and opposition to the scenes to which I have already 
called your attention. In speaking of the coming of men 
into the Christian disposition, the writer says : — 

" Ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned 
with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest, and the sound of 
a trumpet, and the voice of words ; which voice they that heard intreated 
that the word should not be spoken to them any more : (For they could 
not endure that which was commanded, and if so much as a beast touch the 
mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart : and so terrible 
was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake :) but ye are 
come unto Mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly 
Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assem- 
bly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the 
judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the 
mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh 
better things than that of Abel." 

The world has had a long and weary march from Mount 
Sinai to Mount Zion. Woe be to him that insists upon 
making that march over again ! For us. Mount Sinai 
stands afar off. We hear the thunder still, but we have 
learned in a better school. Inheriting the knowledge of 
ages, we have risen to a sublimer conception of God than 



228 BIBLE STUDIES. 

any that can be made by quaking, by the voice of the trum- 
pet or the sound of thunder. We have beheld Love insti- 
tuted as the supreme and central power in this world. Not 
yet fixed, for the world and the church still vibrate, with 
incessant pendulum, between Sinai and Zion, between force 
and persuasion, between fear and affection, between the Law 
and the Gospel, between all that is severe and terrible and 
all that is lenient and comforting. But methinks that, 
more and more as the ages go on, men are brought into 
the spirit of the New Dispensation ; more and more the 
thunder ceases to be heard by mankind ; more and more 
we are lifted above its noise. To him who knows no love 
there must be fear ; but perfect love casts out fear : and 
he who stands in the sphere of hope and expectation is 
beyond the reach of the thunder and its quaking, and is 
not far from Mount Zion. 

May God give to us all the spirit of the New Dispensa- 
tion. While we are gratefully looking back to see the 
steps that have been taken to bring the human family up 
from their low estate at large, we may rejoice that along 
the slopes of Mount Sinai the human race is gradually 
advancing and rising toward Mount Zion that is above. 



XII. 
THE SABBATH, 



"And he said unto them, the Sabbath was made for man, and not man 
for the Sabbath." — Mark ii. 27. 



This is an additional clause to the passage which I read 
in the opening service, more fully recorded in Mark. 
" Therefore the son of man is Lord also of the Sabbath " 
occurs in both passages. I shall return, in due time, to the 
thought that is contained in this passage. In the dis- 
courses on the preceding Sunday nights I have taken a 
very general survey of the structure and contents of the 
book of Genesis and the book of Exodus. It has not been 
possible to expound all the points of interest. There are 
so many, in the light of modern experience and scholar- 
ship, that I should make but very slow progress if I at- 
tempted to unveil all of them. But if the external history 
of any people is more romantic and more acceptable, the 
institutions and interior economy of no other people is 
more important. 

We have now come to that point in the books of the Old 
Testament where the Mosaic economy, as it has been 
called, is opened up. I confess that when I read of it in 
Exodus, in Leviticus, and in Deuteronomy, it seems to me 
as though it must strike an ordinary reader as a very 
strange jumble ; because, as compared with our systems of 
law, which throughout the ages have been developed into 
logical sequences, and in which all the great interests of 
society are separated and treated one by one with minute 



Sunday evening, January 12, 1879. Lesson : Luke vi. 1-12. 



230 BIBLE STUDIES. 

order and procedure, the Mosaic system is a jumble. The 
most contrary things lie together in the same bed. If in 
one verse it speaks of land, in the next verse it speaks of 
the household, and in the next it speats of the relations of 
personal property. One thing treads upon another with- 
out any logical method. So it comes to pass that this econ- 
omy would seem to be a collection of proverbs. They lie 
in juxtaposition, they touch, but they do not cohere. And 
it is my purpose, so far as it can be done without wearying 
you, to portray some of the great Mosaic institutions that 
have never been mpre profoundly or wisely or beneficially 
treated than they were in the economy of the wilderness. 
If you sympathize with me, you will be both grateful and 
surprised to see at how early a time some of the most use- 
ful elements of modern society had their origin, their devel- 
opment, and their establishment. 

We are to bear in mind, then, in entering upon this gen- 
eral view, what was before the mind of this great lawgiver 
and leader — this man of antiquity who stands before 
the past as the vast statues of Egypt stood before their 
temples, so huge as to hide the very temples themselves. 
There never has been a name on earth of one who, in antiq- 
uity or in modern times, being a purely secular man, ex- 
celled him. We are to bear in mind that his was the first 
attempt of any considerable importance to organize human 
society around about an ideal, invisible God. It has been 
called "a theocracy "; and by that was meant, it has been 
more generally supposed, merely the rule of a priesthood. 
But it was a bona fide attempt on the part of Moses to or- 
ganize a commonwealth that should have no visible head ; 
that should be apparent to man only through the element 
of faith — the imagination sanctified to sacred uses. The 
source of all authority, the origin of all law, the process of 
all providence, was, in the mind of every one of the citi- 
zens, to be in the great commonwealth above. So that, 
while nature and primitive organization would be drawing 
men to the earth, because they were of the earth, there 
would be in the whole framework of their government 



THE SABBATH. 231 

elements that should draw them toward the invisible and 
superior. 

It was designed to produce, by such a process as this, a 
people that should be, without exception, in the field, in 
the city, and in the way, filled with overflowing happiness. 
Happiness was the end that was being sought — happiness 
through righteousness, which everywhere is declared to 
bring forth peace and prosperity. Nor can I conceive of a 
more sublime motto than that which is given in the seventh 
of Deuteronomy, and the sixth verse. This is the last letter 
of Moses in the Book of Deuteronomy. He said, in his 
dying testimony : — 

" Thou art an holy people unto Jehovah thy God : Jehovah thy God hath 
chosen thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that 
are upon the face of the earth." 

Here was the national motto : no lion emblazoned on a 
blood-red shield ; no ravenous eagle ; but, Thou art a pecul- 
iar people whom God hath set apart for himself to make them a 
happy people. Such was the legend that Moses gave in the 
furtherance of the great end of his life and mission. 

Through their immediate and personal adhesion to God, 
then, he instituted various economies. The first one which 
we enter upon in the order of time is the Sabbath — the 
setting apart and consecration for rest of a seventh portion 
of every man's time. It is to this matter, whose importance 
far transcends our ordinary apprehension of it, that I wish 
to call your attention to-night. 

There is mention of the observance of the seventh day 
— and it is the first mention of it — after the escape of the 
Israelites from Egypt, and while they were wandering in 
the desert, before they came to Mount Sinai, and when the 
manna fell from heaven. You will recollect that the com- 
mand was to gather on the sixth day for both- the sixth 
and the seventh ; for, said Moses, To-morrow is a solemn 
rest, a holy Sabbath unto the Lord. And there was the 
correspondence of the miracle that if manna was gathered 
on any day except the sixth, and kept more than one day, 
it was corrupted, but that if gathered on the sixth day it 



232 BIBLE STUDIES. 

was not corrupted when it was kept over a day. This 
marks the fact that before they received the law at Mount 
Sinai there had been introduced a recognition and an 
observance of the seventh day as Sabbath — rest-day — in 
the camp. 

How far back this went no one can tell. All efforts to 
show that the Sabbath day was observed from the begin- 
ning have been, it seems to me, worse than failures. They 
have involved such a use of Scripture as would justify any 
amount of wrenching, special pleading, and perversion. 
There is no evidence in the whole history of the patriarchs 
that they ever observed that day. There is nothing to 
show that the seventh day, or any part of the time, was 
observed in Egypt. It may have been, but there is no 
evidence of it. They may, in those early times, have worn 
scarlet hoods, but there is no evidence of it. They may 
have had shoe-buckles, but there is no evidence of that. 
And there is no evidence that in any nation then, or at any 
anterior period in the Israelitish nation, the seventh day 
was observed. However that may be, it comes to our 
notice as being authoritatively established for regular 
observance only when the camp sat down before Mount 
Sinai, and it was commanded in the Decalogue. 

Why the seventh day should have been chosen has been 
a matter of a good deal of debate. All nations have not 
accepted this. Some peoples have counted their week as 
five days, some as six days, and some as ten days, and 
though the greatest number of nations have had a week 
composed of seven days, and the inquiry is a natural one, 
How should they have fallen upon this seven-day week ? 
the reason given is that in six days the Lord created the 
heaven and the earth, and rested on the seventh day. 
That may be a reason in regard to God, but it is not a rea- 
son in regard to nations. The presumption is that it is a 
legend transmuted into an allegation. 

The more probable reason is this : In the early day the 
shepherd life predominated. You have never had any ex-" 
perience of such a life. We know very well that when men 



THE SABBATH. 233 

follow the sea they become observant of clouds, of wind, of 
phenomena that are strange to us. We know that Indians 
living in the woods sharply see in nature and cunningly 
use many things that are blind to us. We could not fol- 
low trails. We could not even find our way by means of 
the blazes of the frontiersmen of the forest. We, dwelling 
in cities and old communities, never had practice of this 
sort. 

Now, people living on the plains, watching their flocks 
day and night, become companionable with the stars ; they 
learn to observe the heavens familiarly ; and there are 
influences — I do not mean magical or mystic influences, 
but a kind of education — derived from a contemplation of 
the stellar universe, by pastoral people, of which we know 
very little. The changing moon, whose changes average 
completion once in about twenty-eight days, being the 
nearest of the observed heavenly bodies, naturally attracted 
the attention of a pastoral people, and took priority in 
their mind ; and by dividing that period into quarters, 
roughly corresponding to the moon's changes, they got 
seven days. If this lunar theory is not correct, at any rate 
it is ingenious ; and it is supposed by many to have been 
the origin of the division of time into periods of seven 
days. 

Around this reason was afterwards developed, I suppose, 
other reasons, of which I shall speak in a moment ; and 
among them was the legend or transmitted tradition of 
the days of the creation. 

Let us now look at the position which the Sabbath takes 
in the Law, as it was given by Moses, or through Moses, 
to the people. There is a marked difference between the 
statement of Moses in Deuteronomy and that made by him 
in Exodus. I shall read both of them. 

" Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy [that is, separate and 
apart from all others]. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work : 
but the seventh day is the Sabbath of Jehovah thy God [Jehovah's rest] : 
in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy 
manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is 
within thy gates : for in six days Jehovah made heaven and earth, the sea, 



234 BIBLE STUDIES. 

and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore Jehovah 
blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it." 

So it stands in Exodus. In Deutei-onomy it reads : — 
'• Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it, as Jfehovah thy God hath com- 
manded thee. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work : but the 
seventh day is the Sabbath of Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt not do 
any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy 
maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy 
stranger that is within thy gates ; that thy manservant and thy maidservant 
may rest as well as thou." 

These last words are not contained in Exodus ; nor do 
they express the reason given in Exodus for keeping that 
day, that it was a celebration of creative rest. The added 
reason is stated as follows : — 

" Remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that Je- 
hovah thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a 
stretched out arm : therefore Jehovah thy God commanded thee to keep 
the Sabbath day." 

It was a day set forth in Deuteronomy to commemorate 
emancipation from Egyptian toil and bondage. It has a 
counterpart in the fact that the Israelites were emancipated 
from toil and bondage in Egypt when God brought them 
out from that land, and that the Sabbath day, among other 
things, was to celebrate this event. When you take both 
passages, and see that Moses left out the creative reason, 
and introduced another, it leads us to lend a more ready 
ear to the statement of those who say that, time after time, 
in the early periods, books were amended, not by making 
new books, but by taking an old one and adding to it. 
This was not unbefitting the simplicity of infantile author- 
ship. Sometimes one reason was given and sometimes the 
other. 

But the fundamental reason does not lie in these histor- 
ical associations, however well adapted to catch and hold 
the attention of the Hebrews ; it lies in the nature of the 
thing itself — what it is, why it is, and what the effect of it 
is, in the nature of things. 

You will observe, in the first place, that in both accounts 
there is this one central idea, that one-seventh part of a 



THE SABB'ATH. 235 

man*s time is redeemed from toil. Rest, rest, is the pri- 
mary idea ; and that falls in entirely with the whole con- 
stitution of man in every age and nation. We know very 
well that continuity within certain limited bounds is on 
the way to success, and we know that beyond those 
bounds it is on the way to disaster. We know that one 
single article of food, being continued for a long time, at 
last nauseates and disgusts. We know that things iterated, 
iterated, and iterated, often become hateful and injurious. 
One cannot be a wheel in a machine and revolve with 
perpetual revolution, and be a man. Variety, change, is 
indispensable to manhood. So there is appointed a great 
intermission during every single twenty-four hours. One- 
third of every man's life is a sabbath. In every day eight 
hours are a sabbath — a rest — unto man, unto nature, and, 
since God has arranged it, unto God. On this principle 
civilization develops more, apparently, than on any other ; 
and it is on this principle that the commandment of the 
observance of one day in seven is founded. Whether or 
not one day in eight, one day in nine, or one day in ten 
would have done about as well as one day in seven, I 
do not know ; but I think experience has shown to the satis- 
faction of man that one day in seven practically meets the 
exigencies of human life. It does not embarrass indus- 
try. About as often as that the human system needs a 
change — a change which comes from throwing off the 
habits of routine ever3Aday industries, and giving the man 
head-room, breath-room, heart-room, and hand-room. 

But then, take notice that while we have one day 
appointed for rest, there is not, so far as the Ten Command- 
ments are concerned, a single word said about worship on 
that day. As we have been brought up, what we think of 
the Sabbath or Rest-day, is, that we must not talk loud ; 
that we must not run about the house and make a noise ; 
that we must be combed and dressed ; that we must go to 
church ; that we must unite in the religious services, 
whether they are light or heavy ; that we must not, going 
back home, feel free to enjoy ourselves according to our 



236 BIBLE STUDIES. 

nature ; that we must walk with propriety ; that we must 
be quiet ; that we must not go visiting or riding ; that we 
must not discharge ordinary duties ; that we must keep 
the day as straight and as perpend iciflar as possible. 

That idea of the Sabbath day remains without much 
decoration, without any considerable amount of relief, 
without a great deal of comfort, overruling instincts of a 
very wholesome' nature. Such is about the notion derived 
from Puritan practice, strained through New England. 
Well, that was not the Sabbath day of Mount Sinai. Such 
a Sabbath was not known to the Jews. It is a modern 
invention. It is a perfect transformation. 
" In it [the Sabbath day] thou shalt not do any work." 

There is a command to rest, but there is no command to 
worship. Such was not the primitive injunction. 

And yet, while this rest from work, as distinguished 
from the modern methods of Sunday keeping, was made 
prominent, it carried with it a great deal more than the 
mere idea of cessation from toil : it insisted on cessation 
from toil on the part of the poor and needy. It was the 
foundation on which was to be built protection of the 
rights sacred to individuality. The individual might read 
for himself. 

" The seventh day is the Sabbath of Jehovah thy God : in it thou shalt 
not do any work [Look at the particularity of it], thou [head of the fam- 
ily], nor thy son, nor thy daughter [and as these might be exempt by favor, 
and the work might be shoved over to others], nor thy manservant, nor 
thy maidservant." 

Then, as if that did not include enough, it goes on to 
secure humanity for the inferior creation : — 
"Nor thy cattle." 

And after emancipation, during one-seventh part of the 
time, had been provided for the man, and his whole 
household, including the servants, and his possessions, — 
the horse, the dog, the ox, the ass, everything that was his, 
— next came the Chinaman, I was going to say ; but " thy 
stranger that is within thy gates " are the words in the 
Scripture record. All nations in antiquity were taught to 



THE SABBATH. 237 

hate strangers, who were often put to the sword in former 
days ; but here comes this humane injunction : You shall 
treat the stranger as you treat your own self, your house- 
hold, and your property. That made it more emphatic ; 
and the reason given is, that thy manservant and thy maid- 
servant may rest as ivell as thou. No aristocracy here ! No 
privileged class ! The kitchen and the parlor stand on the 
same rights. The man that goes afoot and the man that 
rides in his carriage stand before God with no distinction 
in this respect. If the democracy of Mount Sinai should 
sweep through life, what confusions and overturnings it 
would produce ! 

" The Lord loveth the stranger, in giving him food and 
raiment." Then this pathetic appeal is added : " Love >»<? 
therefore the stranger ; for ye were strangers in the land of 
Egypt r 

Then there is the injunction to remember those in bondage 
— to have compassion on those in bonds. 

So that, aside from the idea of the sanctity and antiquity 
of this portion of time — one day of rest in seven derived 
from the creative act — there came to them this national 
and patriotic reason : You shall give a day of absolute rest to 
everything that lives and breathes within your land. There was 
the Mosaic humanity. 

Such w^as the spirit, not only of Moses, but of the Israel- 
itish people — that is, those who represented the best estate 
of Hebrew thought and feeling. For, in all the backslid- 
ings and delinquencies of these people there were rising 
up priests and prophets and reformers who undertook to 
bring them back to obedience to their national laws ; and 
you will find that in all the condemnations uttered by 
the prophets, greater or minor, it is the manhood on which 
their minds rest. Turn, for instance, to Amos, one of the 
minor prophets, the eighth chapter and the fourth verse, 
and read : — 

" Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of 
the land to fail, Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell 
corn ? and the Sahl-iath, that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah 



238 BIBLE STUDIES. 

small, and the shekel great [that is, making the measure small and the price 
large. You see the spirit of commerce was very ancient], and falsifying the 
balances by deceit? That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy 
for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat? Jehovah hath 
sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I wi^l never forget any of their 
works. Shall not the land tremble for this ? " 

Tremble for what ? A technical violation of the Sabbath ? 
No : for a violation of the Sabbath so as to oppress the 
poor and needy. 

If you turn to the denunciations in Isaiah and Jeremiah, 
the marrow of them is this : not that men have gone aside 
from the observation of the Sabbath, but that they have 
gone aside from it in such a way as to overwhelm the poor 
and the needy. There never was a book in this world so 
anti-monarchical as the Old Testament ; and there never 
was a book in which natural religion and natural humanity 
ran so deep and were so universal as in this same Old Tes- 
tament, which is so despised, and w^hich men say we have 
so outgrown that we do not need it any longer. It is true 
that the Old Testament is like an old pasture-field, and 
needs to be plowed — not, however, for" the sake of throw- 
ing it away, but that we may use it more to our advantage, 
and make more out of it than is being made by neglect, by 
misrepresentation, or by Pharisaical stringency on minor 
matters. 

It is, then, all the way down through the Old Testament, 
a plea for the Sabbath on account of the poor and needy. 
And when we come to the New Testament what do we 
find ? We find Christ rising in the same spirit, and facing 
the perversions that had knitted up the Sabbath, and 
made it, as it were, a net, holding people in bondage and 
restriction, giving liberty only to those who were not 
poor and necessitous. He struck through this bondage 
and this restriction, and declared that the poor and needy 
were to be released. He said they were not made for the 
Sabbath, as if to keep that day were more important than 
to take care of the people. 

Out upon your nefarious pretensions ! he indignantly 
declared. Is not a man more valuable than a sheep ? 



THE SABBATH. 239 

Tliere is no one of you that would not pull a sheep out of 
a ditch on the Sabbath ; and yet you would prevent my 
healing a man that is blind, or that has a withered hand, 
on that holy day ! My Father worketh hitherto on the 
Sabbath. Doth the sun stand still on the Sabbath ; doth 
not the grass grow ; doth not the genial spring bring 
forth the blade on the Sabbath day ? My Father thinks, 
and wills, and plans, and blazes forth forever more, on Sab- 
baths and on week days. '' My Father worketh hitherto, 
and I work ;" but it is a work of humanity. It is a work 
that gives rest, recuperation, more life, more power : not 
a work of exhaustive care. It is not an everlasting grind 
at distasteful industry. It is a regeneration of man. It is 
a lifting up of new life in a man, and giving him opportu- 
nity to use that life rationally. 

It was for such a Sabbath as this that Christ pleaded, 
and against the absurd and puerile restrictions of the nar- 
row constructionists of the old Pharisaic period. 

I shall not stop to amuse you with an account, at the 
present time (it may be in order to do it by and by), of 
W'hat curious provisions were made for keeping the Sab- 
bath day, as to when it came in and when it went out ; as 
to what was work and what was not work ; as to whether 
or not a man might have Gentile servants that were not 
forbidden to light fires and cook food. According to the 
Hebrew economy all work must end on the day before the 
Sabbath, and no excuse whatever was valid for putting 
even domestic labor upon the servants. This was carried 
to such an extent that we can scarcely read about it with- 
out a smile. 

This division of time, then, though known to other nations, 
and possibly to the Patriarchs, was enforced and made into 
a positive institution only under the Hebrew Common- 
wealth. One-seventh part of the time was defended against 
avarice, against involuntary toil, against the mastery of 
man over man. When the seventh day came, the father and 
the son were both alike to God. The father could not say 
to the son, "Go," or " Do." The son was released, and the 



240 BIBLE STUDIES. 

father and the son stood equal. On that Sabbath day a man 
could not be driven afield, or starved if he did not do a 
given amount of labor. The poorest man was even with 
the richest. There was no man that could force his fellow 
man to-go forth and labor on that day. Every man stood 
in his full manhood. It was a day of emancipation. It 
perpetually set forth the liberation of the children of Israel 
from the bondage by which they were ground down in 
Egypt. So every seventh day God said to the great mass 
of poor, overworked and underfed people, " I release you 
to-day, and this is your vacation." 

As a matter of history, also, it is true that the observance 
of the Sabbath was not in any sense restrictive or burden- 
some. While it set man free from servile toil, it did not 
have an equivalent of bondage in the form of worship. 
There are many ways in which a man can be oppressed. 
Not a^one the hoe and the plow, but the Confession of 
Faith and the Catechism, may make men toil and sweat. 
A man may have rest from bone and muscle weariness, 
but may have ten times as much fatigue of brain. The 
day set as a pearl among all the others, and the most blessed 
of the seven, is the Sabbath : and it should be perpetually 
observed as a day of Rest. 

There are some aspects of the Lord's day in my memory 
as a day of poetry. On that day it seemed to my young 
eyes as though the sacredness of God had descended from 
heaven and clothed the earth. Distances were never so 
long. Sounds were never so melodious. Never was there 
mystic brooding of heaven upon earth such as came down 
to my imagination on summer Sunday mornings that broke 
with light and beauty upon the Connecticut hills ; and if 
then I could have been taken by the hand, and led into the 
garden of the Lord, and taught to hold communion with 
the invisible, there would not have been one dark spot on 
my recollection of the supreme beauty of that day of eman- 
cipation from labor of soul and body. 

But alas for the catechism ! Alas for the dinners of 
which I was defrauded because I could not learn it ! 



THE SAB B ATI J. 241 

Alas for the hours when I was shut up in a room by my- 
self and made to study it ! Alas for the wearisomeness of 
going to church ! Alas for the aching of my little legs that 
could not reach the floor, and swung from the high board 
seats ! Alas for the rigor of that well-intended Puritan 
Sunday on which, though I rested in body, I was weary and 
worn out in mind ! Though the sun came over the eastern 
horizon bringing scintillations of beauty and pleasure and 
even of heavenly imaginings to my youthful mind, when it 
went down over the western horizon there was nothing 
that said " Good riddance to you ! " with the eagerness 
that I did ; for the Sabbath was not a liberty to me : it was 
to me an imprisonment — a restriction of my freedom. 

Now, this did not belong to the original Sabbath day. 
That day was not meant to be an oppression. It is a misuse 
of it that makes it a burden in any sense. 

The obligation of the Sabbath is not derived from the 
sanctions of Mount Sinai nor from Moses. That day 
is obligatory upon us on account of our human nature. 
This goes deeper than either of the other reasons stated. 
That which experience, prolonged and various, determines 
to be best for each and for all, is the voice of God. That 
which, after suitable trial, is found to be most effectual in 
developing and advancing mankind, has a sanction that 
could not have been given by Mount Sinai. Nature, when 
at last we understand it, is the voice of God, and is as 
solemn as any recorded word ; and the Sabbath day comes 
to us as divine because it comes with an experience that 
justifies its institution, that renders apparent its wisdom 
and humanity, and that makes it even more desirable now 
than it was in antiquity. 

Hence, futile are all disputes about the transfer of the 
Jewish Sabbath to the Christian dispensation. Above all, 
futile are those Pharisaic difficulties which spring up as to 
what day we shall observe — whether we must go on observ- 
ing the old Jewish Saturday, or whether there is any 
authority for observing our Sunday. As if men had kept 

track of the seventh day of creation, when God wound up 
16 



242 BIBLE STUDIES. 

his work, and rested ! As if the Jews, or anybody, were 
sure of being on that very track ! As if, in the vast confu- 
sions of time, there were any credible or authoritative record 
that could enable one to determine' with certainty whether 
or not he was on the same road which was followed in this 
respect by men of primitive da}^s ! The question never 
was, whether the Sabbath should be the seventh day of 
the week : the question always was, whether it should be 
a seventh part of the week. It is one-seventh part that 
brings emancipation to every man, woman, and child — that 
releases from, burden the v/hole community. That is the 
Sabbath — not the particular day on which it falls. If there 
is any sufficient reason for putting it on Monday, Monday 
is good enough ; or on Tuesday, Tuesday is good enough ; 
or on any other day, that day is good enough ; but it is 
important that it should be observed on the same day by 
the w^hole nation, and by every nation, so that there shall be 
consentaneousness of observation, and so, fair-play and co- 
operation. It is not wise for one man to observe one day 
and another another ; that would fill the community with 
infinite confusions and disputes ; but while there should be 
one day of rest in each week, it is of no importance whether 
it falls on Saturday, on Sunday, or on any other day. 
There is no direct command on the subject. The only 
obligation resting upon us to observe Sunday is that which 
comes up through our nature. We are to do it because it 
is best for us, for our children, for our manservants, for 
our maidservants, for our beasts of burden, and for the 
stranger that is within our gates. Such is our duty in re- 
gard to the Sabbath day, and that is deep enough, broad 
enough, authoritative enough, for every wise man. 

We need this day as much as it was needed by the peo- 
ple of the olden time. Indeed, we need it more than they 
did. While civilization has not changed the necessity for 
rest during one-seventh part of the time, it has made the 
need more imperative, because of the excessive toil of this 
age of the world ; because of added cerebration. Not 
only do the bones and muscles need rest, but the whole 



THE SABBATH. 243 

head and nervous system need it. Reason, moral sentiment, 
domestic affection, and the ten thousand cares of compli- 
cated modern life, call out for rest more imperiously than 
ever they did in the wilderness, or in the primitive condi- 
tions of a simpler form of society. To-day the industry of 
the globe is such that the vast, uncountable majority of 
men are employed in drudgery. Taking the world through 
— and more and more as you come up into semi-civilization 
and civilization — men are working like machines, without 
any interest except that of getting their bread and raiment. 
Their wages, their means of livelihood, is all that they see 
coming from their incessant toil. Beyond that they have 
no share in that wealth which they are instrumental in 
producing. They weave with rapidly-flying shuttle, send- 
ing forth a gold-and-silver thread ; and the garments that 
come out of the loom are not for their wearing but for 
the wearing of others. 

Never was there a period of the world in which the 
great mass of workingmen had so much right as now to 
demand absolute rest during one-seventh part of the time 
— so much right to come out of the dreary mine ; out of 
the dirty stithy ; out of the whirling factory ; out of the 
field, with its burdensome tasks ; out of the many subordi- 
nations that belong to the lower offices of complicated 
society. 

This is eminently a day in which the bottom should 
come up to the top, and breathe. As you have seen, on 
some lake, at evening twilight, when man and beast and 
bird no longer vex, myriad little fishes dotting and dim- 
pling the whole surface, as they freely rise out of the water 
to breathe the air, so on one day of the week every living 
creature has a right to come to the surface, as it were, and 
take in the sweet fresh air of God's day of rest. 

Then, a question which belongs to the subject of the 
normal occupation of man, is that measureless fatigue 
which the competitions of business bring upon the inter- 
mediary classes. There is absolute remorselessness in the 
industry of these great cities. It may be likened to the 



244 BIBLE STUDIES, 

revolution of a vast treadmill wheel, which goes round 
and round, so that when a person is once upon it he must 
keep stepping. The organized industries of society are so 
various, so extensive, so tremendous, that the master me- 
chanic, the merchant, the lawyer, the teacher, everybody 
that lives by his brains, finds himself perpetually fagged, 
jaded, worn, till the very flesh cries out, and till the care- 
furrows upon the face show what is the stress to which he 
is subjected. And there is nothing that men given to toil 
need more than rest. If there be any difference between 
us and those that lived in antiquity, it is that we need a 
Sabbath more than they did. 

But let us bear in mind that rest does not altogether 
mean non-laboriousness, though to some extent it means 
that. I do not hold the old Puritan views of Sunday. I 
try to follow the spirit of Christ. 

When it was proposed that the city railroad cars should 
not run on Sunday, I was asked to sign a petition to that 
effect. I would not do it. I was glad that there was some 
way in which the crowded population of the city could get 
out once in seven days into the country. When it was pro- 
posed to open the public libraries and reading-rooms, and 
let men and women have an opportunity to read there on 
Sunday, it was resisted, and I defended it. I advocate it 
still. I believe in a church Sabbath such as has been trans- 
mitted to us by our fathers ; but I couple something else 
with it. I do not think Christian people do well by their 
servants, who live so affluently on the Sabbath day that 
those servants have no chance for rest ; or, if they do not 
have it on that day they ought to have it on another. I do 
not believe the ferryboats, or city railroads, or steamboats, 
or hotels, have any right, by paying extreme wages, or in 
any other way, to defraud the men who serve them of their 
Sabbath. I do not mean by this that boats and cars and 
hotels should not be run, but that if it is worth while to 
run them on that day, it is but right that there should be 
release of mind and body provided with rotation of duties, 
so that all should have a Sabbath every week. 



THE SABBATH. 245 

It is said, " You want to send men to the country : what 
about the drivers and conductors? Don't they want a 
Sabbath ? " Certainly they do ; and I plead for them. 
There should be such arrangements that every conductor, 
every driver, every waiter, every cook, and everybody 
under him, should have a portion, at least, of every Sunday 
for rest, or if not of Sunday then of some other day. I 
plead for those that are on the great wheel of society, which 
is perpetually turning round and round, and that have no 
Sabbath. Though they may not miss it, we ought to miss 
it for them. It is for us to think for the unthinking, and to 
be wise for the unwise. 

It is often said, " It is better for the laboring man 
that he should go out into the country than that he 
should stay at home and go to church." Well, if it is a 
question as to whether a man shall remain in his corner 
grocery or squalid garret or go to the country on Sunday, 
let him go to the country, in God's name ! If it is a ques- 
tion as to whether he shall spend Sunday on the street 
corners or whether he shall go into the open fields on that 
day in summer, there can be no doubt as to which is best. 
It is far more wholesome for him to go into the open fields, 
especially if he carries with him the spirit of the Old and 
New Testaments. 

But is that the best way in which the laboring man can 
spend the Sabbath ? Is there not a better way for him to 
rest even than that ? What we want for rest on Sunday is 
change, variety, to give vitality to that part of ourselves 
which is not much developed during the other six days of 
the week ; and no men need so much cerebral stimulus as 
men who give six days out of every seven to muscular or 
mechanical work. To make a man think wath the highest 
faculties, to give him inspiration, poetry, moral emotion — 
that is a renovation such as cannot come by merely snor- 
ing on a bed, or walking in a garden or field ; and I hold 
that every man, in proportion as he labors during the week, 
needs the spiritualization and uplifting which come from 
gathering for public worship, with its songs and teachings. 



246 BIBLE STUDIES. 

If, therefore, having this rest of change for one class of 
faculties, men also take social joy in another class, I have 
not one word to say against that. . I believe in it. 1 do 
not believe that men are to be tied up. Although the Jews 
were put to death if they worked on the Sabbath, they had 
festivities all day long. It was a day of rejoicing, of sing- 
ing, of merriment. In the time of Christ it was a day of 
feasting, and he himself went on Sabbath days to feasts at 
rich men's houses. He would have been turned out of the 
Presbytery, out of the Council, in other words, out of the 
church, if he had done that in New England. There are 
things that Paul and his Master did in their time which 
they could not have done if they had lived in our time. 

So, the true Christian Sabbath is one in which a man 
rests from labor, and which reinvigorates his social affec- 
tions. And what a blessed day it is that brings a man into 
better acquaintance with his wife and children, and into 
fuller fellowship with his neighbors ! How much of rust 
would be rubbed off if there were universal sanctif3dng in- 
tercourse, so that men should everywhere meet as Chris- 
tian neighbors and households ! 

We want more relaxation in our Sundays. And I must 
utter another protest. I must raise my voice against the 
want of a proper distribution of the duties of a wise 
observance of the Sabbath. There are persons in every 
church in this community who are overburdened with 
labor. There are those who rise early for private devotion, 
and then care for the children, and then attend the preach- 
ing services in the forenoon, and then go to the Sunday- 
school in the afternoon, and then take part in a prayer- 
meeting, and then go to the night service, and then return 
home overwearied and stupid. That is what they call 
''keeping Sunday." Nobody has any business to keep 
Sunday in that way, — making it the hardest day of the 
whole week. No man should be overtasked. Everyone 
should have something to do, so as to make the day easier 
for all. But some willing workers take upon themselves so 
much that they are spiritual slaves on the Lord's day. To 



THE SABBATH. 247 

them, instead of being a day of illumination it is a day of 
severe drudgery. 

Of course, I do not have any rest on Sunday. There is 
no Sunday for me when you have it. To me it is the hard- 
est day of the whole week. Were it not that I take my rest 
in installments out of the other days I should be sabbath- 
less. So it must be, from the very organization of society, 
with those who preach the Gospel. But for the great mass 
of those who are engaged in heavy, exhausting labor on 
other days during the week, Sunday is the day of rest. 

Therefore, from every consideration, it behooves us to be 
thankful for the primitive institution of the Sabbath ; for 
that Mosaic economy whose fruits have come down to us ; 
for that experience which has taught us to base the observ- 
ance of the Sabbath, not on a historic command, not on a 
word pronounced, but on an experience four thousand 
years deep, and as wide as the human family, whatever the 
obscuration, the perplexity, and the limitation may be with 
which we have received it. Circumcision has gone, sacri- 
fices have gone, Mosaic laws and governments have gone ; 
but the Sabbath moves on. Like the pillar of fire that 
went by night before the Israelites in the desert, it is lumi- 
nous. It leads forward the civilization of the present. 
Commencing in remote antiquity, it has come down to us 
dropping honey upon the ages as it came ; it has been an 
unspeakable blessing to the races of mankind ; it has 
brought to us an experience mightier than the voices of 
Mount Sinai ; and it is for us to make it more melodious 
and sweeter, and to send it as a grand chant of liberty 
down through the ages that are yet to come, until at last 
the earthly Sabbath shall mingle with the heavenly Sab- 
bath, and the heaven and earth shall be one, to rejoice to- 
gether forever more. 



XIII. 

MOSAIC INSTITUTES: 

HUMANITY. 



I PROPOSE to enter, to-night, upon an exposition of the 
laws of Moses. I shall not discuss the question of their 
historical development ; for, whether the Pentateuch rep- 
resents a work accomplished and recorded in the lifetime 
of Moses, or whether upon the basis of such a record it 
received additional elements at the hands of scribes from 
age to age, so that we owe it, as many scholars think, in its 
present form, to the age following Solomon, while a matter 
of some historical interest, it is. not a matter of sufficient 
interest to my purpose for me to discuss it. Whatever 
may have been the origin of the Pentateuch, there it 
stands; and it contains a complete system of customs, 
rules, regulations, and laws, besides an account of some in- 
stitutions. 

When you examine the laws that are embodied in this 
system you will perceive at once that the popular notion 
that all of them were whispered into the ears of Moses by 
the lips of Jehovah when he was upon the Mount, and that 
Moses was a writing machine who took down what was 
dictated to him, is not sustained by the facts. It will be 
found that many of these -laws were handed down from 
the patriarchs, having been held by them in common with 
the race from which they sprang, and that they repre- 
sented a given state of attainment in antiquity. It will be 
found that many of the customs sprang up in the primi- 



Sunday evening, February 2, 1.S79. I.esson : Mark xii. 1-34. 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: HUMANITY, M9 

tive period, when large numbers of Israelites resided in 
Egypt, in the land of Goshen. It will be found that there 
are reminiscences, hints, suggestions, remolded or bor- 
rowed from the Egyptians. We are to bear in mind that 
Moses himself was educated in all the wisdom of Egypt ; 
and it is scarcely possible that he should not carry with 
him some of the elements that were incorporated into the 
system which he was to establish in the promised land. It 
will be seen, also, that many of the precepts were gathered 
from the experiences of the desert. 

So the laws and institutions of Moses represent a wide 
field. As a matter of fact we are not at liberty to say that 
they were all told him at once, and that he wrote them 
down as they were given to him of God. They were de- 
veloped under a divine providence that worked through 
hundreds of years. 

This does not detract at all from the divinity of their in- 
spiration ; it merely gives us another view of the method 
by which divine laws were made known to men. As they 
stand in the Pentateuch one is at first almost discouraged 
in attempting to comprehend them. There is no order in 
their arrangement. They may be said, in one sense, to be 
jumbled up. All sorts of laws on all sorts of subjects are 
strung together in juxtaposition, but without any logical 
relation or scientific classification. And they are repeated. 
You find them stated in Exodus ; you find them made 
known again in Leviticus ; you find them restated in Num- 
bers ; and you find them more at large set forth in Deu- 
teronomy. So there is at once a sense of repetitiousness, 
and almost of incongruity. It was not given to that early 
time philosophically to classify, to develop, as the Romans 
did first, largely, laws pertaining to certain subjects, to 
gather them together, and to give them a logical unfolding 
and natural sequence ; such classification or development 
did not belong to the literature or genius of Semitic an- 
tiquity. We are to take the Mosaic institutes as we find 
them. I think that if you follow me in examining and 
attempting to classify them, you will agree with me, before 



250 BIBLE STUDIES. 

we are done, that they are abundantly rich ; and I shall be 
surprised if you are not surprised at the extent of this 
richness. You will find in the Old Testament Scriptures 
much ore that you have not yet dug, and will acknowledge 
that the Old Testament is not used up yet. There are here 
laws that cover the whole range of society life ; laws per- 
taining to the individual, to the household, to national and 
civil life ; laws relating to home and foreign policy ; laws 
having to do with property and commerce ; laws that 
regulated public worship and determined religion with all 
its requirements ; in short, laws that affected the whole 
moral, social, and civil estate of man. 

There is a vague popular idea that the laws of Moses 
concern themselves chiefly with forms and ceremonies and 
sacrifices ; but I think you will be surprised to find how 
much of wise injunction and restriction was contained in 
them which is yet needed in the world, concerning every- 
day business and home life. 

Especially I shall ask your attention, to-night, to the 
consideration that was given by the great lawgiver of 
antiquity to the matter of humanity. The foundation 
principle, we are informed by our Master, of the whole 
economy, was, " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 
This is the first and great commandment. And the sec- 
ond is like unto it : Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thy- 
self." "On these two commandments hang all the Law 
and the Prophets," said Christ. I shall put the more im- 
portant last, and discuss the second first. 

Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. It becomes a mat- 
ter of very great interest, — and it ought to be something 
more than curiosity, — how the Mosaic enactments came to 
contain this injunction quoted by our Master, which he said 
contained the whole intent and meaning of the Old Testa 
ment Scriptures. When you examine it, is it true to fact ? 
The more strict duties imposed as acts of worship I shall 
not discuss, but I shall consider the duties of man to man, 
and shall not by any means exhaust them to-night. 



MOSAIC INSTirUTES : HUMANITY, 25 1 

In the first place, you are to bear in mind that the Israel- 
ites were to be an agricultural and not a commercial peo- 
ple. They sprang from a pastoral nation. Much in their 
habits began in Egypt, where they were semi-pastoral — 
pastoral and agricultural. They resumed again in the wil- 
derness their pastoral life. It was the design of their leader 
and lawgiver that when they entered the promised land 
agriculture should be the basis of their industry, — that the 
State should live by agriculture, not commerce. One rea- 
son was that intense love of nature which was a large ele- 
ment in the Hebrew make-up — the keeping of men in 
communion with the great natural world. Another reason 
was the fact that commerce was so undeveloped at that 
time that it made manifest to the mind of Moses only its 
dangers. Still another reason was the fact that an agri- 
cultural people are not a roving people. They can be held. 
They can be made obedient to fixed laws. They do not 
fritter away home influence by foreign travel. They are 
not apt to import new customs. And if it was the intent 
of the lawgiver to develop a high moral state in the Israel- 
itish people, it was desirable that they should stay at home 
where they could be indoctrinated in wholesome laws. 
That which is alleged to have been cruel in the Old Testa- 
ment economy, such, for instance, as the cutting off of na- 
tions, I think will receive, if not a perfect solution, yet 
much amelioration, when we consider that the object of 
the lawgiver was to keep this nation separate from every 
other till they had been thoroughly educated in the new 
idea of a pure and holy God, ruling pure and holy men. 

In short, as the mother keeps the children at home, 
sequesters them, lest they be injured by a neighborhood 
which is injurious to the welfare of children, and does not 
send them out until they have attained character and man- 
hood, and then lets them go forth, so the divine economy 
in antiquity was to take this select people — the peculiar 
people of God — and bury them, as it were, in obscurity, and 
develop them until they should attain such moral stature 
that it should be safe for them to go out ; and then came 



2 $2 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the words, "Go ye now into all the world." To maintain 
this separateness, and repel the temptations that came 
from heathen nations, often required a degree of severity, 
not to say cruelty, which shocks men *in modern times — 
although I think modern times to be far more refinedly 
cruel than antiquity was. 

When the Hebrews took possession by violence of the 
promised land it was distributed first among the tribes, 
and then, within the tribes, it was apportioned so that 
every family had its share. But no man held his land in 
fee-simple ; neither was it held in fee-simple by the priests 
or by the government : for God was their King ; and the 
theory announced and followed was that all the territory 
belonged to God. The consequence was that when it was 
distributed to the holders they were tenants, and not 
owners. And they paid rent (what is called "tithes") for 
the support of priestly tribes, and of the State. Therefore, 
according to the Mosaic plan, the Jews never owned the 
soil in fee-simple in the early day. 

You will find this distinctly stated in Leviticus, the twen- 
ty-fifth chapter : " The land shall not be sold forever [in per- 
petuity] : for the land is mine ; for ye are strangers and so- 
journers with me." The land could be exchanged between 
man and man, but it could not be sold forever. All pur- 
chases of land were subject to redemption whenever the 
seller chose to redeem it, or, if he could not do it, whenever 
his next of kin chose to redeem it. 

Wherever there was a sale of land, it was under these limi- 
tations and conditions. And once in fifty years all land 
came back anyhow. There were seven days, and one was 
a day of rest. Then there were seven years, with a sab- 
batic year of rest. Then there were seven times seven 
years, making forty-nine, and the fiftieth was the jubilee, 
or great year of rest. 

Now, in the partition of land it was leased, subject to re- 
demption at whatever time the man leasing chose to redeem 
it ; or, if he could not do it, at whatever time some rich kin 
could redeem it ; and it was always subject to inevitable 



MOSAIC IiYSTITUTES: IIUMAXITY. 253 

return to the original household or family on the fiftieth 
year. So it was not in the power of any one tribe grad- 
ually to accumulate or appropriate land of another tribe ; 
nor was it in the power of one strong man gradually to 
gather territory into his hands, and leave the great majority 
of his fellows destitute of soil. To those who have given 
thought to the land question, especially in the old and 
crowded territories of England, there is much food for re- 
flection in this land theory and law contained in the Mosaic 
institutes, especially as to its bearing on man's treatment 
of man. 

Another peculiarity in regard to the land and its cultiva- 
tion was this : that the land could only be cultivated six 
years out of seven. It was not permitted to cultivate the 
land at all the seventh year. It was to have a rest. And 
the promise was that if they would obey the command- 
ments of God he would make the sixth year so fruitful that 
with the natural wild increase of the fields, forests, or- 
chards, and gardens, the whole seventh year should be abun- 
dantly supplied with food. They were not to plow, nor 
reap, nor in anywise pursue the industries of agriculture. 
The whole land had to have its rest, an entire year of it, 
every seven years. 

The Hebrews being placed on this land, the most strik- 
ing feature that arrests our attention is the extraordinary 
humanity that was commanded and that was developed 
under the Mosaic economy. The sacredness of human life 
was the very first step. It was made sacred by every de- 
vice. 

" Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." 

Murder was death to the murderer. No compromise 
was permitted at that time. There were no courts such as 
clear murderers in our da}'. There was no provision that 
sought to build up a reputation by snatching from punish- 
ment notorious murderers, as there are nowadays in every 
State of our Union. Whoever took the life of a man forfeited 
his own life ; and it was expressly forbidden to make any 



254 BIBLE STUDIES. 

compromise, even if the criminal offered untold money for 
his life. He was a murderer, and he must pay the penalty 
by death. It was made a crime to be so much as careless 
of life. If a man committed manslaughter, if, without in- 
tending it, by accident, he destroyed his neighbor, if by 
some chance stroke, not seeing the victim, he in any way 
destroyed human life, it was the right of the next of kin to 
the man killed to pursue and slay the slayer, if he could do 
so before he got into a city of refuge. The unintentional 
destruction of life was ranked with murder ; but cities of 
refuge were made both east and west of the river Jordan, 
to which men who had accidentally destroyed the life of an- 
other man could flee. It was commanded that the roads 
be kept open so that men under such circumstances could 
travel easily, and reach one of these cities, and be safe. Thus 
w^hen one man by some mischance killed a fellow man, he 
dropped his flail or spade, or whatever else he might have 
in his hand, and fled ; for the avenger of the spilled blood, 
the next of kin, was straightway in pursuit of him, to kill 
him if he overtook him ; bat if he reached a city of refuge 
before he was overtaken, he could not be harmed. Yet, 
lest men who had committed murder should pretend that it 
was accidental when it was intentional, it was retained that 
every man who should flee to a city of refuge for preserva- 
tion should be tried by the officers of the city, who would 
listen to his story, and to the pursuer's story, and who, if 
they judged him to be innocent would give him refuge, but 
who, if they judged him to be guilty, would deny him shel- 
ter within the city's bounds, thus leaving him to be deprived 
of his life, w^hich he had forfeited. This sacredness of life 
under the law of Moses stands out in singular contrast to 
the indifference of life which prevailed among all the 
ancient nations, and even that which obtains in these later 
days. Not only was the murderer to be destroyed ; not 
only was manslaughter to be in some sense punished, in 
order that men might take care ; but even carelessness such 
that a man's life should be destroyed by an animal was 
made penal as to the owner. You will find this to be one 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: HUMANITY. 255 

of the earliest declarations. It is contained in the twenty- 
first chapter of Exodus, and is again mentioned in later 
enactments. 

" If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die : then the ox shall be 
sm-ely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten ; but the owner of the ox shall 
be quit. But if the ox were wont to push with his horn in time past, and it 
hath been testified to his owner, and he hath not kept him in, but that he 
hath killed a man or a woman ; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also 
shall be put to death." 

It is as if it were said, human life is so sacred that you 
must not only not murder, but you must not even be care- 
less, lest your carelessness may lead to the destruction of 
human life ; and your responsibility for care against acci- 
dent extends even to your animals. If some animal sud- 
denly develops fury which he never exhibited before, that 
animal shall be accursed. You shall not eat him, and he 
shall not be eaten. He is impure. Human life was so 
sacred that the wild animal was condemned to destruction 
if he destroyed it. And on the other hand, if the owner 
of the animal knew that he was dangerous, and did not 
keep him in or slaughter him, and he destroyed a man or 
a woman, not only was the animal subject to destruction, 
but the owner was condemned to death. 

Is there a rumseller in this town that does not know 
what it is to have his cups push with the horns ? Is there 
a man that is selling liquid damnation, day and night, who 
does not know what is the peril that it carries with it ? 
Do not we know that there are ten thousand devilish bulls 
that push with the horns as dangerously as any animal, 
and that intoxicating drink is one of them ? And is the 
dealer in such drink to go scot-free ? Might we not wisely 
go back for our laws to the desert, and take counsel of 
Moses and the old Israelites ? 

Still further the sacredness of human life was defended. 
If a man were found dead in any neighborhood, and no one 
knew how he came to lose his life, then there was to be an 
accounting. It was such a discipline as was very effectually 
used in our war, and such as is used in all great wars. 
Where soldiers are being picked off, where the guards of 



256 BIBLE STUDIES. 

railroads are being lurked after and destroyed, the inhabit- 
ants of the township or county in which the occurrence 
takes place are held responsible for it. The neighborhood 
shall pay for men picked off in that way. 

It is supposed that this provision is modern, but it is very 
ancient. You will find, for instance, in the twenty-first 
chapter of Deuteronomy, the following : — 

" If one be found slain in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee to 
possess it, lying in the field, and it be not known who hath slain him : then 
thy elders and thy judges shall come forth, and they shall measure unto the 
cities which are round about him that is slain : and it shall be, that the city 
which is next unto the slain man, even the elders of that city shall take an 
heifer, which hath not been wrought with, and which hath not drawn in the 
yoke ; and the elders of that city shall bring down the heifer unto a rough 
valley, which is neither eared nor sown, and shall strike off the heifer's neck 
there in the valley. 

"And the priests the sons of Levi shall come near ; for them the Lord thy 
God hath chosen to minister unto him, and to bless in the name of the Lord ; 
and by their word shall every controversy and every stroke be tried : and all 
the elders of that city, that are next unto the slain man, shall wash their 
hands over the heifer that is beheaded in the valley : and they shall answer 
and say, Our hands have not shed this blood, neither have our eyes seen it. 
Be merciful, O Lord, unto [Forgive, O Lord,] thy people Israel, whom 
thou hast redeemed, and lay not innocent blood unto thy people of Israel's 
charge. 

"And the blood shall be forgiven them," 

There is but one case that I have found in which human 
life may be peremptorily taken, and no account be given, 
and that is where a man is a thief and a robber, and is dis- 
covered breaking into a house to steal. The owner or 
occupant of that house may destroy him at once, and be 
clear. I wish that Mosaic economy were more prevalent in 
our time. It is the impunity that robbers have, it is the 
cowardly manhood with which men betray their trust in 
failing to defend their own possessions, and allowing a 
thief to take anything he pleases, and go, rather than hurt 
him — it is this that gives such encouragement to burglars, 
whereas, if nine men out of every ten who enter a house 
for the purpose of robbing it were slaughtered, robbers 
would be very soon diminished and the community would 
be a great deal better off. 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: HUMANITY. 257 

But while the whole question of the sanctity of human 
life is disclosed by this brief examination of the laws of 
Moses, I would not have you suppose that it begins or ends 
here. This is but a single specimen, though it lies at the 
root of society. 

I wish, next, to call your attention to the profound con- 
cern which the State, as organized by Moses, was called 
upon to take for the poor and the unfortunate. In the first 
place, it was ordained, in the twenty-third chapter of 
Deuteronomy, and the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth 
verses, that any man suffering from hunger, and walking 
through his neighbor's field or orchard .or garden, had a 
right to eat whatever he wanted — whether melons, apples, 
or what not. He must not pocket them, or walk off with 
them in a bag, but no man that was hungry was to be 
denied the privilege of satisfying his hunger. 

** When thou comest into thy neighbor's vineyard, then thou mayest eat 
grapes thy fill at thine own pleasure ; but thou shalt not put any in thy vessel. 
When thou comest into the standing corn of thy neighbor, then thou mayest 
pluck the ears with thine hand ; but thou shalt not move a sickle unto thy 
neighbor's standing corn." 

The poor were not to starve, property was not so sacred 
as human life, and whoever had food in the field owned it 
only up to the point where a fellow being was perishing 
with hunger : then it belonged to the man that needed it — 
so much of it as he needed. 

More than that, the poor man had a right to glean. 
That right is set forth so strongly in the next chapter — the 
twenty-fourth — that I will read an extract from it. 

" When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and hast forgot a 
sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again to fetch it." 

If it slid off the cart behind you and you did not know it, 
and it was hid by a tree or stone, or if you forgot it, let it 
stay there. 

"It shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow: that 
the Lord thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hands. When thou 
beatest thine olive tree, thou shalt not go over the boughs again [the second 
time, that is] : it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the 
widow. When thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not 
17 



258 BIBLE STUDIES. 

glean it afterward: it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the 
widow. And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in the land 
of Egypt : therefore I command thee to do this thing." 

What humanity there was in it ! ' 

You have read the inimitable story of Ruth and Boaz. 
There is portrayed in an exquisite idyllic picture this great 
beneficence, by which every man was obliged, as it were, 
to make the poor partners of his prosperity. 

Great consideration, also, was shown toward the poor in 
the matter of their wages. 

" Thou shalt not oppress a hired servant that is poor and needy, whether 
he be of thy brethren, or of thy strangers that are in thy land within thy gates." 

He was not speaking of the Chinese at that time : he 
was speaking of strangers that belonged around about the 
head of the Kedron. 

"At his day [that is, the day on which he earns it] thou shalt give him 
his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it; for he is poor, and setteth 
his heart upon it : lest he cry against thee unto the Lord, and it be sin unto 
thee." 

In the matter of paying wages as soon as they are 
earned, would it not be worth while to have the law of 
Moses instituted in some of our families where we do not 
pay up the servants for weeks and months? Would it not 
be well to have some of Moses' laws enforced in some of 
the business houses in New York, and in the great manu- 
facturing centers where caps, shirts, and clothes are made, 
where the wages are cut down to the lowest point, and 
where the employees find it hard to get what is promised 
them ? 

There is in New York an institution that has the bless- 
ing of God on it. It is an association of gentlemen and 
ladies to enforce the payment of their wages to the poor, 
and hundreds and thousands of dollars have been collected 
through the beneficence of this association without a pen- 
ny's expense to those for whom it was collected. It is not 
modern, however. The origin of it was in the Mosaic in- 
stitutes. Men were commanded to pay the poor their 
wages, and to pay them the day they earned them, not only 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: HUMANITY. 259 

because they were poor, but because in dealing with the 
poor men were forbidden all usury ; and that does not 
mean excessive interest, but any interest, — usance, — pay- 
ment for the use of the loan. 

" Thou shalt not lend upon usury to thy brother." 

This was not a commercial nation, and interest then did 
not bear the same relation to money that it does now. 
The Hebrews were an agricultural people, and they had no 
occasion for borrowing capital, as we have, for purposes of 
development. Men worked day by day, and yet, on ac- 
count of inequality of soil, or because of difference of skill, 
or for other reasons, some men were in penury and want 
while others had an abundance ; and men were forbidden 
to lend to their brethren and charge them anything for the 
accommodation. 

" Thou shalt not lend upon usury to thy brother ; usury of money, usury 
of victuals, usury of anything that is lent upon usury : unto a stranger thou 
mayest lend upon usury ; but unto thy brother thou shalt not lend upon 
usury : that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all that thou settest thine 
hand to in the land whither thou goest to possess it." 

And if they got in debt one to another, there was a limit 
even to the obligation of a debt that was incurred ; for it 
is implied that debts not paid, or unliquidated, by reason 
of inability, in process of time became outlawed ; and 
every seventh year settled all debts. In other words, there 
was a periodical bankrupt act by which everything unset- 
tled when the seventh year came round settled itself. No 
man could be tied up all his life on account of what he 
owed ; and no one could make poor men literally his 
slaves, under the pressure of constantly accumulating debt. 
They rose up every seventh year free from the debts under 
which they had been struggling. What wisdom ! What 
humanity ! 

But it might be that men, under such circumstances as 
these, would shut up their hearts against their neighbors, 
since they could not take usury, and since debts incurred 
and not paid were quashed on the seventh year ; but pro- 
vision was made against that. 



26o BIBLE STUDIES. 

"At the end of every seven years thou shalt make a release. And this 
is the manner of the release : Every creditor that lendeth aught unto his 
neighbor shall release it ; he shall not exact it of his neighbor, or of his 
brother ; because it is called the Lord's release.^ Of a foreigner thou mayest 
exact it again : but that which is thine with thy brother thine hand shall 
release ; save when there shall be no poor among you ; for the Lord shall 
greatly bless thee in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an 
inheritance to possess it : only if thou carefully hearken unto the voice of the 
Lord thy God, to observe to do all these commandments which I command 
thee this day. For the Lord thy God blesseth thee, as he promised thee : 
and thou shalt lend unto many nations, but thou shalt not borrow ; and thou 
shalt reign over many nations, but they shall not reign over thee. 

" If there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren within any of 
thy gates in thy land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not 
harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother : but thou 
shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient 
for his need, in that which he wanteth. Beware that there be not a thought 
in thy wicked heart, saying, The seventh year, the year of release, is at hand ; 
and thine eye be evil against thy poor brother, and thou givest him naught ; 
and he cry unto the Lord against thee, and it be sin unto thee. Thou shalt 
surely give him, and thine heart shall not be grieved when thou givest unto 
him : because that for this thing the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thy 
works, and in all that thou puttest thine hand unto. 

" For the poor shall never cease out of the land : therefore I command 
thee, saying. Thou shalt open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, 
and to thy needy, in thy land." 

Further than this, where men lent on the promise of re- 
payment, and the borrower was unable to keep his prom- 
ise, humanity was also enjoined, showing that the heart of 
the lawgiver, as inspired by the wisdom and goodness of 
God, was in intimate sympathy with the helpless and the 
needy. Turn to the twenty-fourth chapter of Deuteronomy 
and you will find him speaking after this manner : — 
"No man shall take the nether or the upper millstone to pledge." 
It is not likely that it was our ordinary kind of mill. In 
antiquity mills were as portable as old-fashioned hand 
coffee-mills, with a revolving stone turned by hand. 
Again : — 

" When thou dost lend thy brother anything, thou shalt not go into his 
house to fetch his pledge. Thou shalt stand abroad, and the man to whom 
thou dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroad unto thee. And if the man 
be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge." 



MOSAIC IXSTirUTES: IIUMAKJTY. 261 

In other words, you are not to issue an execution, and, 
taking the officer, or yourself acting as an officer, go in and 
pick out the best things you can find, and remove them. 
The man himself is to be allowed to select what he can 
easiest spare. If he select a garment (and one who is poor 
has nothing better than that, often) you have no right to 
keep it. As to setting a man's furniture out on the side- 
walk, as to taking his bed from under him, as to kicking 
him into the street, — it is an outrage that never entered into 
the head of Moses, even to forbid it. 

More than this, you will observe that while there was a 
distinction made between the Israelites and foreigners 
there was no discrimination that was oppressive. There 
was to be a greater degree of love and a larger exercise of 
humanity toward the Hebrew^s ; but there was the most 
explicit provision made for kindness in the treatment of 
the foreigner. If you will turn to the book of Exodus you 
will be struck with the ground and reason given for it. In 
the twelfth chapter and the forty-ninth verse is this com- 
mand : — 

"One law shall be to him that is homeborn, and unto the stranger that 
sojourneth among you." 

" When a stranger shall sojourn with thee, and will keep the passover to 
the Lord, let all his males be circumcised [enter into Abraham's covenant 
with God], and then let him come near and keep it; and he shall be as one 
that is born in the land : for no uncircumcised person shall eat thereof." 

He may come in and take part with you if he please ; 
but if he do not please you shall not press him. Toleration, 
a large consideration of the natural rights of men, is a very 
striking feature here. 

Look at the repetitious care with which the rights of 
men, as distinguished from Jewish rights, are set forth and 
guarded in the nineteenth chapter of Leviticus, the thirty- 
third and thirty-fourth verses : — 

"And if a stranger sojourn with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. 
But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be unto you as one born among 
you, and thou shalt love him as thyself ; for ye were strangers in the land 
of Egypt : I am Jehovah your God." 

Look at the repetition, also, in Deuteronomy, which is 



262 BIBLE STUDIES. 

even stronger yet, in some respects, in the tenth chapter, 
from the seventeenth verse to the nineteenth : — 

*' For Jehovah your God is God of gods, and l^ord of lords, a great God, 
a mighty, and a terrible, which regardeth not persons, nor taketh reward : 
he doth execute the judgment of the fatherless and widow, and loveth the 
stranger, in giving him food and raiment, Love ye therefore the stranger : 
for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." 

Hear this, ye Christian people that have trod down the 
African as dirt in the street ! Hear this, O Christian 
nation that is destroying, not the stranger in the land, but 
the original occupant, who held possession of it before ye 
came hither ! Hear this, ye that refuse to let China stand by 
herself, that broke down her towers and demanded that she 
should come forth and become one of the nations of the 
earth, and that then, when she came forth reluctantly, and 
sent out her scholars, teachers, and laborers into our land, 
said, " The Chinaman must go " — that said, first, " He shall 
not stay at home ;" and, second, "He shall not abide here ; 
he shall be swept into the ocean ! " Nearly four thousand 
years have gone, and the world in many regards has been 
ripened, but the heart of this people to-day is coarser and 
harder than it was when Moses led the Israelites in the 
desert. There shall be one law for him that is homeborn and 
for him that comes among yoiL — one law for the German, one 
law" for the Irishman, one law for the American, and, as God 
is just, one law for the Chinaman, throughout this land ! 
Are we to sit supine and indifferent — we that have the 
whole thunder of the Old Testament rising up against us ? 
Are we to say, " Politicians are doing it, and we shall lose 
the election if we interfere " ? Is iniquity to be enforced as 
law, and are provisions for the protection of our fellow men 
to go by default, and are the very foundations on which 
this great nation stands to be undermined, and are those 
that are working these mischiefs to be tolerated without 
rebuke and indignation ? The judgments of God will 
neither linger nor slumber. Accursed be the nation that 
despises the poor and maltreats the stranger ! Accursed 
be the people that execute injustice upon the head of the 



Mosaic institutes: humanity. 263 

helpless and those that are ready to perish ! I care noth- 
ing for politics, but I care everything for principle. I care 
nothing for party, this or that, compared with the honor of 
our people — compared with the glory of this great free- 
born nation, that ought to be ashamed to set an example 
that would make the desert blush for inhumanity ! 

Pardon me — I must go back to Moses ; and it is a great 
way back ! I wish to call your attention to another fea- 
ture in the development of the great humanity of the laws 
of Moses, namely, the nature of the punishments among 
the Jews as contrasted with the penalties inflicted by other 
nations. The national punishment was stoning. Death by 
that mode is probably as easy as death by almost any other 
mode. A sound blow on the head settles it. After receiv- 
ing such a blow men are no longer conscious, and there- 
fore do not suffer. Stoning was the national method of 
execution. The sword came next — especially in the cases 
of those that suffered by reason of sentence of war. Be- 
side this, there were no cruel punishments of men among 
the Israelites. In other nations men were slowly roasted 
in ashes and embers ; their feet were cut off ; their hands 
were removed ; their eyes were put out ; they were sawn 
asunder ; they were impaled, a stake being driven through 
the whole length of their bodies ; and they were crucified ; 
all of these were foreign punishments : but the legislation 
of Moses Vv^as stainless in that regard. There was not a 
cruel punishment permitted by it. It allowed no torments. 
While it insisted upon exact justice, it was administered 
with the greatest humanity capable of producing the re- 
qiiired effect. 

But look at the bloody laws of England. Look at our 
own earlier legislation. We ought to be ashamed to com- 
pare it with the Mosaic humanities. 

Not only were all these things true that I have mentioned 
to-night, but I call your attention briefly to the extraordi- 
nary stretch of humane principles toward slaves, animals, 
and nature itself. There is not a parallel in the legislation 
of anv nation. 



264 BIBLE STUDIES. 

In the first place, it was forbidden to make slaves of 
Hebrews even in the sense in which it was permitted to 
make slaves of foreigners. You might hire or take a man 
for service for six years, and he would go free on the 
seventh year. That was the extent of the service that was 
allowed to be inflicted on a native born Hebrew. It w-as 
like hiring a man for a term of years. The Roman law of 
slavery never prevailed in Judea or Palestine — that ac- 
cursed law that disfranchised a man and took away his 
manhood, and ranked him as an animal, and bought and 
sold him without regard to his feeling or interest. The 
feature of Roman slavery which under American slavery 
allowed the making of the condition of the slave as bad as 
it might be, was unknown to the Jews. 

Under the Jewish system the slave had a right to redeem 
himself if he could. Nay, if he was maltreated, if a brutal 
master smote him so as to maim him, that set him free. If 
he lost an eye, that emancipated him. If the treatment he 
received in the household was such that he fled, that fact 
w^as considered to be evidence that he was oppressed ; and 
it was forbidden that he be caught and returned to his 
master. It was taken for granted that persons from for- 
eign nations w^ould find their condition as slaves so much 
better that they w^ould not run away unless there was good 
reason for it ; and anything like our Fugitive Slave Law 
could not have been thought of in the time of Moses. It 
took about four thousand years of religion to develop that 
abomination. 

Nay, more : around about the service of foreign-born 
men, such as it was, were thrown all the alleviations that 
belong to the native population. These men had the Sab- 
bath to themselves as much as the Jews. The sabbatic 
year was theirs as much as it was their masters'. The 
great jubilee, also, was theirs as much as it was their mas- 
ters'. They partook of all great festivals. They had a 
right to be circumcised and become Hebrew^s by adoption. 
If they did not want to be set free the master had to make 
provision for them. 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: IIUMAXITY. 265 

"And it shall be, if he sa}- unto thee, I will not go away from thee ; because 
he loveth thee and thine house, because he is well with thee ; then thou 
shalt take an awl, and thrust it through his ear unto the door, and he shall 
be thy servant forever." 

I do not recollect the record of a case in which any 
American slave who was offered his freedom, and given 
permission to go, loved servitude better than emancipation ; 
and what must have been the nature of Jewish slavery 
when this enactment was made ? The time has gone by 
for us to be interested in this subject as we should have 
been twenty years ago. 

As I have said, not only slaves but animals were not to 
be abused. It was forbidden to muzzle the ox that trod 
out the corn. As the poor had a right to glean, so, when 
the crop was being threshed, the ox had a right to eat 
what he needed, and he was not to be muzzled. And if 
mercy was to be shown toward an animal, how much more 
should mercy be shown toward a man, who is so much 
better than an ox ! 

Again, you will find this decree: — 

" Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk." 

In other words, the parental relation was to be so sacred 
that a Jew should, by association, shrink from slaying a 
kid, a lamb, or a calf, and then cooking it in its mother's 
milk. It ought to shock one's sensibility, and it did 
theirs. What humanity to animals, that even their paren- 
tal feelings were to be respected ! They were defended 
from becoming victims to those horrible, over-boiling 
human lusts which existed in contemporaneous nations. 

And even nature was treated with great tenderness. 
Allow me to read from Leviticus, the nineteenth chapter 
and the twenty-third verse, a remarkable enactment. 

" When ye shall come into the land, and shall have planted all manner 
of trees for food, then ye shall count the fruit thereof as uncircumcised : 
three years shall it be as uncircumcised unto you : it shall not be eaten of. 
But in the fourth year all the fruit thereof shall be holy to praise Jehovah 
withal. And in the fifth year shall ye eat of the fruit thereof, that it may 
yield unto you the increase thereof : I am Jehovah your God." 

If anyone planted a grape vine he was forbidden to gather 



266 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the tender fruit, the first little clusters, for four years of its 
bearing, and so weaken its growth ; but after that the vine 
was strong enough to bear harvests and to admit of their 
being gathered and consumed without injury. 

And if a bird's nest chanced to be in the way, in any tree, 
or on the ground, they were commanded not to destroy it. 
To the bird, the sweet singer, the minister of joy, they were 
to be humane. 

Be humane, then, to the bird ; be humane to the animal ; 
be humane to the slave ; and be humane to the foreigner. 
Take care of the poor, and take care of your neighbor. 
When Christ said, " Love thy neighbor as thyself," he gave 
out the key with which to unlock the Old Testament. 
But I have not told you the half of it yet ; and I shall 
resume the subject next Sabbath evening. 



XIV. 
MOSAIC INSTITUTES 
THE HOUSEHOLD, 



" When thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What mean the 
testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgments, which the Lord our God 
hath commanded you ? Then thou shalt say unto thy son. We were Pha- 
raoh's bondmen in Egypt ; and the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a 
mighty hand : and the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and sore, 
upon Egypt, upon Pharaoh, and upon all his household, before our eyes : 
and he brought us out from thence, that he might bring us in, to give us 
the land which he sware unto our fathers. And the Lord commanded us 
to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, 
that he might preserve us alive, as it is at this day. And it shall be our 
righteousness, if we observe to do all these commandments before the 
Lord our God, as he hath commanded us." — Deut. vi. 20-25, 



It may seem as though it were a more profitable thing 
to discuss living nations and contemporaneous events than 
to go back thousands of years to an early people, in an 
Oriental land, of a different language, and of different 
habits, hunting up the memorials of antiquity ; but, quite 
aside from any archeological curiosity, we have a very 
special interest in the study of the early history of the 
Hebrews^; for scarcely less directly descended from that 
people are they that came from the loins of the Hebrews 
than we, who are descended from their spiritual loins. 
The Hebrew laws — the Hebrew Scriptures — have been 
especial companions of the reformers, martyrs, witnesses, 
confessors of the truth throughout Christendom. Those 



Sunday evening, February 16, 1879. Lesson : Deut. vii 6-25. 



268 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Scriptures were largely issued in stormy times ; and, ever 
since, men in stormy times, under pressure, have found 
them eminently congenial to themselves. Although the 
New Testament was not disregarded by our Puritan ances- 
tors, it must be said that they lived largely in the spirit of 
the Old Testament, and were greatly fashioned by the 
Hebrew spirit, which gave to England, and to New Eng- 
land, a kind of intellectual lineage, heart lineage, and polit- 
ical lineage. We have the Greek metaphysics and philos- 
ophy, and we have the Hebrew moral sense ; and though 
they strive mightily, and are not always reconcilable with 
each other, yet we are the children of both. Therefore we 
have a heritage in these old Scriptures. They are the 
birthplace of our thoughts. They are the roots from 
which we are now gathering fruit for many of our dearest 
institutions. We know not how large a part of that which 
dignifies life, and gives value to everything around about 
us, we owe to the spirit of Moses, to the institutions of 
Moses, and to the wonderful developments of the Hebrew 
people. 

I proceed, to-night, to review certain elements that 
belong to the constitution of the Hebrew polity. In my 
last lecture of this series, delivered two weeks ago, I 
attempted to show the spirit of humanity which ran 
through the whole Mosaic economy, that it was of the 
largest type, how it bound men together by the cords of a 
loving hopefulness, working in every relation of society, 
and taking charge of the poor and ignorant. I undertook 
to explain that the laws of Moses were protective of the 
wants of the laboring classes, and of the weak and necessi- 
tous, dealing considerately not only with the poor in all 
their interests, but with the slaves ; and w^ere eminently 
humane toward the stranger ; such being the spirit of 
administration throughout the best years of the Hebrew 
commonwealth, I undertook to demonstrate that even 
with their culprits and in administering justice there was 
no inhumanity ; that while other nations were tormenting 
men for the sake of tormenting them, such cruelty was 



11 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: THE HOUSEHOLD. 269 

never known to the old Hebrews ; that unnecessary pain 
in punishment was avoided by them ; that their whole 
economy was humane. I attempted to show that their 
humanity went still further, and included the entire ani- 
mal kingdom — bird and beast. 

. This whole line of thought might be diversified and in- 
tensified ; but let us pass on, to-night, to the development 
of other elements, and of those that are perhaps more im- 
portant. 

I propose to speak of the condition of woman, and of 
the condition of the family or household, as they existed 
under the ordinances of Moses, and as to a large extent 
they have existed in practical life until this day. It should 
be borne in mind, however, that it would be very unfair to 
bring to bear upon this matter the advanced conditions 
and notions of modern society. It would not be reason- 
able for us to take the results of the experimentation of 
thousands of years on the globe, and go back to the twi- 
light of antiquity, and especially to Oriental peoples, and 
measure their economies by that which is now ascertained 
to be best. This would be as unjust as it would be to take 
the latest astronomical discoveries and methods and make 
them the criterion for judging of the attainments of the 
earliest astronomers of the world. We are to remember 
that the Hebrew^s were an early nation, and we are not to 
be surprised at much that we find in their history. The 
theory of inspiration which we hold does not oblige us to 
suppose that everything which is recorded in the Old 
Testament sprang directly from the hand of God ; but it 
does require us to suppose that there was a supervising 
providence by which the nascent human race was step by 
step developed through childhood and onward. There- 
fore you shall find in the inspired Word records of legisla- 
tion in antiquity that would be utterly intolerable as 
applied to our day, while in the infancy of the race, if they 
were not permissible, they were at any rate to a degree 
excusable. 

I need not say to you that outside of our later modern 



270 BIBLE STUDIES. 

nations the condition of any community may be ascer- 
tained beyond peradventure by the condition of woman 
in it. There never has been a nation, nor will there ever 
be a nation, having prolonged prosperity along with infe- 
rior women ; and there never has been a nation, nor will 
there ever be a nation, without a wholesome, strong, and 
progressive prosperity along with honor to women. 
Therefore, in examining critically the condition of any 
nation, one of the primary questions is, "What has been 
the condition of its women ? Were they slaves ; were they 
creatures of amusement ; were they mere servants of the 
kitchen : or, were they honored as the equals of men ? " We 
must bear in mind that although the style of womanhood 
among the Jews was inferior as compared with woman- 
hood now, yet it was, as compared with that of neighboring 
nations, eminently advanced. The Hebrews only, in antiq- 
uity, so far as I recollect, put any degree of honor upon 
women. But, in the condition of a nation's women you 
shall find the unmistakable traces of its barbarism or civil- 
ization. 

The primitive law undoubtedly was that of power. 
Men worshiped power. It was the august power of na- 
ture that suggested to them deities. Among men those 
were the heroes who had power — the Samsons of antiquity. 
A Hercules was a hero in the olden time. Low, muscular 
strength was first in favor, but afterwards the ability to 
control and lead men; then wealth; and then pomp and 
glory, as elements of power, were objects of admiration. 

From the beginning woman, as weaker than man, was 
disesteemed ; she was not admired ; and such was the 
course of human thought down to within a comparatively 
recent period. You will find, therefore, clear indications 
of this in the primitive condition of the Hebrew women. 

With this explanation, I shall call your attention to the 
remarkable superiority of womanhood among the Hebrews 
as com.pared with every other contemporaneous people. 
In the first place, a woman in her father's house was simply 
a servant. The birth of a daughter in antiquity did not 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: THE HOUSEHOLD. 271 

bring half so much joy as the birth of a son. As a child a 
woman was salable. The father could send his daughter 
to market at any time he pleased. At that early time 
property had not, to use a modern phraseology, differen- 
tiated. Whatever a man had or controlled was property. 
It was at a comparatively late day that men began to con- 
sider that property must mean things, and not persons. 
In ancient times property meant persons, if one had the 
control of persons ; and in the Hebrew economy the 
daughter was the father's property just as much as a book 
or an invention that comes from my brain is my property ; 
and he had absolute control not only of her liberty but of 
her life as well. She had no free choice as to matrimony. 
Her father gave her awa}^, and of course always for a con- 
sideration. When the father was dead then the brother 
took his place ; and in either case she had no volition of her 
own. She inherited nothing by law except where, from lack 
of male inheritors, the estate was likely to go out of the fam- 
ily. In that case she was a " Jack-at-a-pinch" heir. Such 
things mark the genius of an age. An espoused virgin if 
derelict in chastity was put to death ; but her seducer 
was exonerated. He v/as a man, and she was nothing but 
a woman ! The same thing has come down to us. The 
fault of the woman is unpardoned and unpardonable, but 
the fault of the man is condoned by society ; and he walks 
among men and women with unblushing cheek, while she 
walks no more among men or women. Under Moses, how- 
ever, if the woman were a wife, then both man and woman 
were put to death. 

When married — and here the light begins to dawn — the 
Hebrew woman was never made the slave of bondage or 
toil. She was not put to severe tasks, as the squaw is, or 
as many Oriental woman were. Among the Hebrews the 
hardest industry was always imposed upon men. The 
woman was a housekeeper, and did the things that were to 
be done within the house, not being a field laborer. She 
was admitted to the society of men. She was not veiled. 
She did not need to be ashamed of her face. She ate 



272 BIBLE STUDIES. 

with her husband — a thing which the Greek wife was not 
allowed to do in any well-regulated family. It would 
have been considered a breach of decorum for a Greek 
woman to sit at table with her husband if he chose 
to deny her the privilege, — for then, as now, men were 
more sensitive on some points of etiquette than concern- 
ing actual morality. But the Hebrew woman was not her 
husband's slave ; she was his companion. She sat with 
him and communed with him. She took part with him in 
all public services. When he went up to Jerusalem to at- 
tend the great annual service she went with him. She 
could not offer sacrifice as he could, but to her was per- 
mitted the sacred song and the sacred dance. She took 
part generally in the religious observances of her people. 

More than that, there is this remarkable peculiarity of 
the Hebrew nation, that from the earliest day they never 
stood in the way of extraordinary genius in man or in 
woman. They made no distinction of sex in that regard. 
If Miriam could sing and rejoice, Miriam was permitted 
to sing and rejoice : there was no public sentiment or prej- 
udice that rendered her obnoxious. If Deborah had the 
gifts of a leader and judge, there was no objection raised 
to her exercising those gifts. Huldah, the prophetess, in 
times of uncertainty and apprehension, was sent for, be- 
cause it was thought that better wisdom could be obtained 
from this venerable woman than from men. And from the 
beginning to the end of the Hebrew economy, if a woman 
was a poet, an orator, a prophet, — anything that would be 
considered honorable in a man, — she was at liberty to de- 
velop it. But it was only among the Hebrews, except in 
royal families, or in the families of the nobility, that women 
received such consideration. 

Therefore, in reading the Scriptures both of the Old and 
the New Testaments, unless your attention has been called 
to the matter in detail, you will scarcely think of women 
in conditions other than those in which they exist among 
us. Samuel's mother, Elizabeth, Mary, and Martha, the 
women who accompanied Christ — to whom he looked a 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: THE HOUSEHOLD. 273 

portion of the time for his support, and who afterwards 
consorted with tlie apostles, and were organic parts of the 
primitive church — women such as these were honored in 
the old Hebrew commonwealth. 

But there was one vice which existed among the He- 
brews. The origin of it is obscure. It was conspicuous, 
because it stood in such contrast with the many virtues of 
tliat nation. Polygamy was permitted among them. We 
learn in Genesis that monogamy was an ordinance of God ; 
and yet when we come down in the history of the Hebrews 
we find that the great patriarchs were exceptions, and that 
in the time of Moses not only did polygamy exist, but ordi- 
nances were enacted which took it for granted that it was 
permitted by Moses. To those who hold to the doctrine 
of verbal and absolute inspiration here is a predicament ; 
for if you insist that Moses enacted every single one of his 
ordinances because God commanded him to do it, you are 
obliged to take the ground that God ordained polygamy, 
since Moses recognizes it. He never once directly or indi- 
rectly forbids it. 

We are not to suppose that there was no secular reason 
for this. At that time, when property in men was not dis- 
tinguished from property in matter, men owned their 
wives and made them servants ; and there was thus a 
property temptation for a man to own his cook, his cham- 
bermaid, all those who served him. The prevailing econ- 
omy was such as to lead a man to wish to control and 
multiply his industrial forces. 

This vice was permitted, I suppose, for another reason. 
The peculiar attraction of idolatry in the Pagan nations 
was not the polytheistic idea, but the element of sanctified 
lust. There was no one idolatrous service known to an- 
tiquity in which physical lusts and appetites did not play 
an important part ; and it was this fact that drew the 
Israelites to the right and to the left continually. A 
multiplication of wives was an evil, and one that loudly 
called for restriction ; yet it may be supposed that the 

great lawgiver tolerated it under certain limitations, with 
18 



274 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the idea that there was in it that which would keep the 
people from worse defections. Universal experience has 
determined that polygamy is a wrong, not to woman alone, 
but to her children ; nor to them alo];ie, but to the husband ; 
nor to him alone, but to the whole household estate ; nor 
to it alone, but to the entire nation. There never was a 
people since the world began that could maintain existence 
without a fatal weakness, where polygamy was in the house- 
hold. Never was there a nation that was able to sustain 
itself against adversity without being monogamous — and 
there never will be one. Yet, for the Hebrews it was far 
better than to be running after the pagan gods and their 
obscene rites, as they were so often seduced into doing. 

Strangely, in the midst of this great civilized nation of 
ours, that boasts of its Christianity, there has broken out 
this system, organized and enforced ; and the power of 
Christianity has not thus far been able to cope with it ; nor 
is there any prospect that it will be able to cope with it. 
Happily, Utah does not vote on national questions, and 
therefore it may be that politicians will legislate so as to 
insure a final extinguishment of this terrible mischief in 
our midst. If Utah were a State the evil would not be 
overthrown, because votes are the gods of our representa- 
tives at Washington ; but she is not, and her polygamy 
will die under the pressure of surrounding education, thrift, 
and industrial and commercial activity. 

The life of the children among the Hebrews, according 
to the spirit and letter of the Mosaic economy, was very 
precious. The murder of children, whether it was ante- 
natal, or whether it was by their exposure after birth, was 
punishable by death. The destruction of children's lives 
in all nations around about was very widespread, such was 
the barbarous condition of things in those times. But 
nothing of that kind was allowed for a moment under the 
economy of Moses. If a woman destroyed her coming 
child, she was, under the Mosaic law, a murderer with 
deeper guilt than if she slew a child that was actually 
born. It would be well if the humanity toward childhood 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: THE HOUSEHOLD. 275 

of that economy could be made imperative in modern 
times. Talk of the slaughter of the innocents by Herod ! 
In these cities innocents are slaughtered by hundreds and 
thousands ; — and it is not accounted an unvirtuous thing. 

When you look at the economy of the family among the 
Hebrews, at every step the light grows brighter, and the 
picture is more beautiful. Around about the household 
were statutes the most rigorous. Infidelity to the marriage 
relation on the part of a man was punishable with death. 
Divorces were facile, but not on the part of women. No 
woman could bring a petition of divorce from her husband, 
but a man could get a divorce from his wife. Yet this did 
not take place largely in the earlier times. It developed to 
a greater extent in the later and more luxurious days. At 
the time of Christ, although polygamy had gone very 
much out of existence, it existed among the rich, and a 
man could obtain a divorce pretty much at his own option. 
And he found reason enough. If his wife was a little old, 
if she was troublesome on account of sickness, or if for any 
other reason she did not please him, he could put her 
away, and if she was innocent of any impropriety he could 
give her an honorable dismissal. 

Now, when Christ forbade divorce, the whole spirit and 
temper of his command on that subject was to right the 
condition of w^oman, to make her marital relations perma- 
nent, and not dependent on the mere whim and caprice of 
her husband. 

The condition of the family is a matter with which 
the statutes of Moses are never done with dealing. You 
are to bear in mind that in antiquity there were no 
such schools as we have ; that there was no provision for 
universal education ; that there were no books for the 
young ; that knowledge had not been developed except in 
very limited spheres. And yet there was the greatest pains 
taken to educate the children. Let me read you one or 
two passages ; as, for instance, in Deuteronomy, the sixth 
chapter and the sixth verse, where the education of chil- 
dren is insisted upon : — 



276 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine 
heart: and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt 
talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by 
the way, and when thou liest down, and wheij thou risest up. And thou 
shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets 
between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy 
house, and on thy gates. And it shall be, w^hen Jehovah thy God shall 
have brought thee into the land which he sware unto thy fathers, to Abra- 
ham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou 
buildedst not, and houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, 
and wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, which 
thou plantedst not ; when thou shalt have eaten and be full ; then beware 
lest thou forget Jehovah, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, 
from the house of bondage." 

This was the height of teaching. Every house was a 
schoolhouse. Father and mother were school-teachers. 
And they were to teach, not once in a while, on the Sab- 
bath, or at the great festivals, but incessantly. The teach- 
ing was to be the household conversation. It was to be 
the talk in the field, as the parents and the children walked 
together. It was to be their familiar discourse wherever 
they were in the ways of living. The parents were to be 
constantly storing the minds of their children with knowl- 
edge. 

Knowledge of what ? First, of the whole national his- 
tory — of all matters that belonged to the State, and then 
of the statutes and ordinances of God that belonged to 
property, and neighborhood, and service, with this grand 
text which evermore shone as the very fountain of ail duty, 
ThoiL shalt love the Lord thy God, and honoi' Him, and thou 
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. 

The w^hole scope of political economy or civility, as far 
as known among them, was taught to their children by the 
Hebrews. The whole science of life, so far as it was 
known among them — this, the Mosaic law said, they were 
to teach rising up and sitting down, perpetually. And 
they did it. 

Labor was enjoined and made honorable. One of the 
proverbs of the old Jews was, "Whoever brings up a child 
without a tr^ide brings him up to steal." However high 



MOSAIC IXSTITUTES: THE IIOVSEIIOLD. 2J7 

a family was in social position, it was the habit of the Jews 
to teach every boy a trade, as he might see the day when 
it would be necessary for him to labor with his hands. It 
was wisdom in them to bring up their children to industry, 
and see that they had training such that if worse came to 
worst they would have a calling by which they could earn 
their bread. It was sought to give every man the capacity 
to take care of himself, so that there should be no poor 
people in the land. So successfully was this policy carried 
out that it has been said that the word beggar does not 
exist in the Hebrew tongue. Hear that, Ireland ! Hear 
that, Italy ! And all this sprang, not from climate or con- 
dition, but from the application of the Mosaic economy to 
the education of the people. 

Moreover, the children were not brought up to follow 
simply wiiat seemed good in their own sight: they were 
brought up to courtesy, to obedience, to reverence, to in- 
dustry, and to morality. And the parent held no slender 
rod in such a matter as that. In the twenty-first chapter 
of Exodus, the fifteenth and seventeenth verses, you will 
find the following : — 
"He that smiteth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death." 
" He that curseth his father, or his mother, shall surely be put to death." 
Veneration for parents is made obligatory. " Honor thy 
father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the 
land wdiich the Lord thy God giveth thee," was sounded 
in the ears of children from the earliest moment ; and the 
violation of that command brought death. 

Still more imperatively is it laid down in the twenty-first 
chapter of Deuteronomy, from the eighteenth verse on- 
ward: — 

" If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the 
voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have 
chastened him, will not hearken unto them: then shall his father and his 
mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and 
unto the gate of his place ; and they shall say unto the elders of his city, 
This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice ; he is 
a glutton and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with 
stones, that he die : so shalt thou put evil away from among you ; and all 
Israel shall hear, and fear." 



2/3 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Need I tell you that the Jews, being brought up in the 
household on that pattern, very soon became a thorough- 
bred people ? The family was theic special glory. Upon 
it was concentrated all their institutions and economy. It 
was the fountain of fountains. It was the institution that 
bred institutions. It was that toward which the natural 
affections, the educated understanding, and the statutory 
arrangements of the Mosaic economy, chiefly tended. 

If you ask me. How is it that this people are set upon, 
dispersed, abused, persecuted, and made recipients of more 
injustice than ever fell upon the heads of any other people, 
and that yet they cling together, and maintain their nation- 
ality, and endure, and overcome, and exert such a power 
among the nations of the earth ? I reply that it is because 
of the Mosaic economy in which they have been educated, 
and which has continued the family relations which it in- 
stituted. By that economy they have been brought from 
barbarism to civilization ; and their strength to-day — in 
addition to what they have gained in common with other 
civilized nations — is what it always has been in Mosaism. 
That people which consists of groups of households, in 
which the children are developed into the highest forms 
of manhood, is indestructible ; it will never be caught in 
a storm so severe that it will founder ; and such a people 
are the Jews. 

Contrast, for one moment, the condition of woman — the 
wife and the mother — in the Hebrew commonwealth with 
the condition of woman in contemporaneous neighboring 
nations, as, for instance, the Greek. In Greece not only 
was woman a slave, a working creature, but she was de- 
barred from the privilege of public service. She was not 
permitted to sit at table with her lord and master ; she 
was not allowed even to go to the door to see what was 
taking place in the street, unless she was densely veiled ; 
moreover, she must be veiled or she could not sit in an 
assembly ; she had no part or lot in the administration of 
public affairs ; and she was denied the enjoyment of knowl- 
edge. I do not mean that her education was neglected, 



MOSAIC LKSTITUTES: THE HOUSEHOLD. 279 

and that she must grow up ignorant : but there was a 
state of public sentiment in Greece such that if a woman 
showed evidence of refinement and education it was taken 
for granted that she had lost her purity. The whole Greek 
mind and conscience had come to associate ignorance with 
virtue and intelligence with vice, so that one was the sign 
of tlie other. There were among the women of Greece a 
class who were educated. They were taught in history, 
in philosophy, in music, in art, and in statesmanship. They 
were educated as far as the then knowledge of the world 
was capable of being carried. There were no men in 
Greece that were more highly endowed with knowledge 
than many Greek women. But who were they? Women 
who devoted themselves to the pleasure of wealthy and 
cultivated men, and who wished to make themselves attract- 
ive. If a woman meant to be a professional harlot, no 
pains was spared in educating her ; but if a woman meant 
to be a mother, respected and honored, she must not be 
educated, because an educated woman and a harlot had 
come to be identical in the Greek mind. That is the rea- 
son why the Apostle Paul says to the Corinthians, " Let 
your women keep silence in the churches." It was feared 
that if they spoke in the churches it would be said, " They 
are impure persons, and the churches encourage licentious- 
ness." Such was the condition of things in Greece at that 
time. 

It has been remarked in regard to the Greeks that, in 
spite of their wonderful genius and acquirements in all 
intellectual and esthetic directions, they had not enough 
conscience to frame a constitution that would endure, or to 
maintain an administration of public affairs, and that they 
were so corrupt that Sodom and Gomorrah could have 
gone to school to them and learned of them in the lore of 
corruption. 

But the Hebrew nation were of a very different type. 
In spite of their passionate nature and their lapses under 
the allurements of surrounding vicious nations, under the 
Mosaic economy they were trained to a general character 



eSo BIBLE STUDIES. 

of purity and moral uprightness. They established and 
maintained the family ; they honored womanhood ; and 
they educated their children in obedience and love. 

So, then, let me say in closing, that we are indebted to 
the Hebrews for the very roots of our best institutions, 
and among others for the family, out of which comes all 
the sweetness of life. We are indebted to the Hebrew 
polity, more than to anything else in antiquity, for the 
position of woman in our day. 

And let me say another thing : no genuine religious idea 
is without value. While the Roman adoration of the Vir- 
gin Mary is distasteful to our Protestant minds, we are in- 
debted for the chivalry and heroism with which we look 
upon womanhood largely to that idea of transcendent 
purity and beauty handed down through the growing ages. 
I have, in almost every room in my house, from the hands 
of one artist or another, an engraving of the Madonna and 
child. To the devout eye of the Catholic it means the 
Mother of God ; to me it means mother. To them the babe 
means the Son of God ; to me it means childhood. I look 
upon the mother and child, and bless God that that idea, 
begotten in old Hebrew times, at last ripened and came 
down through the medieval ages to our day, and shines 
out from so many canvases for the elevation of our ideal 
of home, for the gratification of our purest imagination 
and our esthetic taste, and brightens by its influence ten 
thousand times ten thousand households. All this we owe 
to Mosaic institutions. 

Let us not, therefore, say that the Old Testament has 
served its purpose ; that we have got through w4th it ; 
that the New Testament is sufficient for us. There is treas- 
ure in the Old Testament, for us, if we know where to look 
for it. 



XV. 

MOSAIC INSTITUTES: 

SOCIAL OBSERVANCE, 



" Ye shall therefore keep all my statutes, and all my judgments, and do 
them : that the land, whither I bring you to dwell therein, spew you not out. 
And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation which I cast out before 
you : for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them. 
But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto 
you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey : I am the Lord 
your God, which have separated you from other peoples. Ye shall there- 
fore put difference between clean beasts and unclean, and between unclean 
fowls and clean : and ye shall not make your souls abominable by beast, or 
by fowl, or by any manner of living thing that creepeth on the ground, which 
I have separated from you as unclean. And ye shall be holy unto me : for 
I the Lord am holy, and have severed you from other peoples, that ye should 
be mine." — Lev. xx. 22-26. 



There have been but two great original nations that 
have had universal power upon the manhood of mankind — 
the Hebrew and the Greek. 

To the end of the world the Greeks will be masters of the 
intellectual elements and stimulators of universal thought 
in its relations to abstract philosophy and to the elements 
of beauty. Further than this they did not go. They were 
empty and void and bankrupt of all true religion and all 
morality. They were a people immoral, indecent, rotten 
to the very core and backbone, and in time they were dis- 
solved in their own bestialities ; but intellectually they were 
the schoolmasters of the ages. 

The Hebrew people, though not deficient in understand- 



Sunday evening, February 23, 1879. Lesson : Psa. cxxxix. 



282 131BLE STUDIES. 

ing and in wisdom, had their power on the moral element 
of man, and they have disclosed a longing for the higher 
life, — an earnest conscience burdened and grieved at sin- 
fulness, and a yearning for an apprehension of true right- 
eousness, that has not been equaled, and that has made 
them masters of the soul. From the days of the fathers to 
the end of time the Hebrew spirit w411 be, as it were, the 
priest and the religious teacher of the universal conscience 
and the universal heart. The Roman people were legis- 
lators and administrators ; other nations have been great 
organizers : but the world has never felt the power either 
of their philosophical reason or of their conscience as it 
has felt the power of the Greeks and the Hebrews. 

Every man admits that, not excluding the understanding, 
the moral element in man is transcendently the greatest ; 
and the Hebrew people were pre-eminently, I will not say 
the authors of morality, but the expounders of it, as it 
stands in their nature and their history. As they were, so 
to speak, the priests, it is a matter of vital importance to 
know something of their origin and of the institutions to 
which they w^ere trained. What if they were crude, what 
if they were secular, what if they were not up to the stand- 
ard of the present age in civilization ; they yet should have 
a profound interest to every man who spiritually comes 
from Abraham. We are to bear in mind that the New 
Testament is an outburst of blossoms and new leaves from 
solid wood of the Old Testament ; and we ought never to 
forget that He whom we worship above all others was a 
Jew, trained in all the lore of the Old Testament. There 
is not a line which we trace on which his eye has not lin- 
gered. Not only the Prophecies with their thunders, and 
the Psalms with their sweet influences, and the Histories 
with their instructions, but the institutions, as well, of the 
old Hebrews, were the subject-matter of Christ's education 
in his childhood and in his manhood ; and are all these 
things to be disengaged and set afloat and lost to us ? It 
is squandering treasure to set aside the Old Testament. 

And yet, apart from its antiquity, it has been a matter of 



MOSAIC IXSrnVTES: SOCIAL OBSERVANCE. 283 

severest criticism, and justly, if you are to accept the old 
theory of inspiration, as if everything that was recorded 
was mandatory, and proceeded from the direct will of 
God. The Old Testament cannot, if it be put on that 
ground, justify the enormous slaughters or hideous cruel- 
ties which, in any age, cannot be justified according to the 
moral sense in which we are educated by the New Testa- 
ment. 

But, aside from that, we are to regard the books of the 
Old Testament as recording the best account of those an- 
cient times, given by the best men, under such influence 
as they were capable of receiving from the divine afflatus, 
and as representing, therefore, an honest endeavor to show 
the highest truth as well as it could be shown at that time, 
when the human soul, the channel of its transmission, was 
not redeemed from external and incidental liabilities to 
error — as, indeed, it is not altogether, even yet ! While on 
this particular ground we can defy scoffing criticism and 
misjudgment, we are also able even more effectually to 
resist those minor strictures which are directed toward a 
great deal of the Mosaic economy. The statutes have 
been subjected, in detail, to criticism and ridicule, as being 
puerile and meaningless, tending to produce a separation 
of nations from neighboring nations, to lead to dissensions 
between brethren, and to create a narrow superstition, 
instead of a generous religion founded upon the nature of 
things. 

Now, in order to judge of any institution wisely it is 
always necessary, first, to consider whether the end sought 
by that institution is a worthy end, and, second, to examine 
whether the means used for accomplishing this are well 
adapted to secure it. As to what was the great drift of the 
Mosaic institutions we are not left in doubt. It was 
designed to build up* "a peculiar people, zealous of good 
works," above all the other peoples that lived upon the 
earth. It was to develop a nation that, in its whole relig- 
ious, civil, and industrial economy should represent the 
utmost purity, equity, activity, and prosperity. The end 



284 BIBLE SrCDIES. 

was certainly noble. Were the laws and institutions wor- 
thy by which that end was sought ? In judging both of 
the objects aimed at and of the means by which it is at- 
tempted to achieve those objects, we must take into view, 
not what would seem wise to us, in our circumstances, at 
this late period of time : we must go back to the age in 
which the events under consideration occurred, to the par- 
ticular races concerned, and to the circumstances of t?ie 
individuals who enacted those events. 

In this case, here was a rising people. They were to 
become a settled nation. The pastoral life to which they 
had been accustomed w^as to be changed to an agricultural 
life. With the establishing of a hereditarily pastoral peo- 
ple as an agricultural people there would of necessity be 
some things that seem essentially unwise. It could not 
be but that in the process of changing a wandering tribe to 
a settled people there would be more or less imperfections. 
Commerce springs up in a later period. Agriculture can 
go only a certain way alone. It must be followed by man- 
ufacturing. And manufacturing must always be accom- 
panied by commerce. This belongs to a later period of 
development. A primitive people, savages, must become 
pastoral ; and a pastoral people, always semi-civilized, 
must become agricultural ; and the agricultural people 
must become manufacturing and commercial. But in the 
beginning it would not have done to have commerce in- 
corporated into the Hebrew economy. If they had gone to 
Tyre and Sidon they would have been swept away by the 
corruptions that on every side were to be found among 
those commercial people of the Orient, who were corrupt 
and corrupting. Therefore the Hebrews must be held 
separate while in training. 

A people of low moral consciousness were to be educated 
to morality. A sensuous race, subject to superstition and 
idolatry, were to be brought to a spiritual worship of 
the one God. And people facile to all temptations of the 
flesh were to be kept away from the miasm of licentious- 
ness. 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: SOCIAL OBSEKVAXCE. 285 

When, therefore, you consider the customs of which I shall 
speak to-night very briefly and cursorily, you are to bear 
in mind that they were substantially such as we yet prac- 
tice toward our children in the family and in our schools. 
We hold our children not subject to a direct and promis- 
cuous intercourse with the world while yet they are chil- 
dren. We do not let them know even things that it is 
proper that they should know later. We treat them as 
children, and do not suffer them to go out into society 
until they are equipped with habits and principles. This 
approves itself as wise to the enlightened judgment. And 
it was important that the Israelites in Palestine should be 
held apart from all damaging intercourse with neighbor- 
ing nations until such time as they could bear the world's 
intercourse. 

Idolatry, as it prevailed at that early period, was not half 
so bad in its theology as in its license. The most damnable 
element in the systems of the nations of antiquity was 
their licentiousness, their lust. License of every form was 
wrought into a ritual. In their temples were prostitutes. 
The temple of Venus at Corinth maintained a thousand 
prostitutes as ministers of worship. By express law in Bab- 
ylon all women were subject to gross indignities. From 
the East were introduced into Rome ideas which led to out- 
rageous sensualism. 

So when you note the nations that surrounded the Israel- 
ites, you find that these people required a worship founded 
not only on intelligence, but on out-reaching virtue and 
purit3^ When, therefore, we find in the law of Moses, as 
we do, an enactment that no father should make a harlot of 
his daughter, we open our eyes with astonishment until we 
come to reflect that it was a principle of the religion of all' 
the nations around about the Israelites to carry their 
daughters as an offering to their gods ; that a prostitution 
of them was an act of dedication to actual worship ; and 
that this ordinance of Moses was an ordinance of purity 
for the cleansing of the atmosphere in which the people 
lived. 



286 BIBLE STUDIES. 

If we turn to Leviticus, which is supposed to be wholly 
a book of ritualism, but which is full of other elements of 
profound interest, we shall find, in the nineteenth chapter, 
the twenty-sixth verse and onward, 'certain Mosaic duties 
which have been ridiculed as being unworthy of the divine 
inspiration — as being perhaps permissible to superstitious 
and degraded priests, but inconsistent with anything like 
authentic divine commandment. The idea that God ever 
promulgated such duties is laughed at as utterly improb- 
able. 

" Ye shall not eat anything with the blood : neither shall ye use enchant- 
ment, nor observe times. Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, 
neither shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. Ye shall not make any 
cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you : I am Je- 
hovah. Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a harlot ; lest 
the land fall to vi^horedom, and the land become full of wickedness. Ye 
shall keep my sabbaths, and reverence my sanctuary : I am Jehovah. Re- 
gard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be 
defiled by them : I am Jehovah your God. Thou shalt rise up before the 
hoary head, and honor the face of the old man, and fear thy God : I am 
Jehovah." 

Let us look a little at this. It does seem, when a man is 
told that the Mosaic institutes contain God's inspired laws, 
and when he finds in them the precept for the barbershop, 
" Ye shall not round the corners of your heads, neither 
shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard," as though these 
were matters fit for ridicule. It would seem as though a 
divine ordinance requiring a man to trim his beard or cut 
his hair in a particular way was rather small, to say the 
least. But there is great and remarkable meaning in this 
ordinance. Look at the tonsure of the Roman priesthood. 
If they make it signify the crown of thorns which the Mas- 
ter wore, is it of no account ? When you understand the 
thought with which their heads are shaven as they are it 
is of a great deal of account. It is not a barber's matter, it 
is a matter as deep as the soul, under such circumstances. 

Is our flag, that floats over ship or fort, of no account ? 
When it rises, every morning, before our eyes, at yonder 
fortification, with the rising sun, and goes down with the 
sun at night, is it merely a matter of bunting — red, white, 



MOSAIC IXSTJTUTES: SOCIAL OBSERVANCE. 2S7 

and blue ? Does it mean nothing but just cloth ? It means 
everything that there is in the national heart and life. It 
is the banner that stands universally for all that pertains to 
us as a civilized nation. 

Now, in heathen nations the cutting of the hair and beard 
was indicative of the religious worship of the wearer. 
Cutting the hair in a given way was supposed to imply 
adhesion to the gods of the foul idolaters, and cutting it 
in a certain other way was supposed to indicate fidelity to 
the God of the Hebrews. When, therefore, Moses said to 
the people of Israel, " Ye shall not round the corners of 
3'our heads, nor mar the corners of thy beard," it was a 
good deal. It was a separation between them and the cus- 
toms of the idolatrous nations around about them. 

Was there no difference, in our civil war, between blue 
and butternut ? To-day a man can wear butternut or any 
other color he pleases, and no man shall call him to ac- 
count for it ; but during that strife it meant all the differ- 
ence between friends and enemies — between men for the 
Union and men for the Confederacy. It indicated a sep- 
aration between them as wide as the whole economy of 
societ}". The cropped round-head of the Puritan and flow- 
ing locks of the Cavalier will occur as a similar badge of 
distinction. And thus, even in so small a matter as a lock 
of hair, there may be conditions in which shall be repre- 
sented separations between those who were devoted to the 
pure Jehovah and those who were wedded to idolatry. 

Consider also some other elements. 

"Ye shall not eat anything with the blood : neither shall ye use enchant- 
ment, nor observe times." 

It was not that they were not to observe days and nights 
and months and years ; that was universal and right ; but 
it was a dissuasion against the observance of what are called 
"signs," — auguries such as are observed by many com- 
mon people even to-day under the influence of superstition ; 
and how wise was that economy which led Moses to forbid 
the Israelites, in the first place, to go to wizards, soothsay- 
ers, practicers of second-sight, or those that had mediumistic 



288 BIBLE STUDIES. 

powers — persons that professed to know by intuition 
what was happening or what was going to happen to men I 
From the beginning of the race down to the present day 
people have been deluded by pretenders like these ; and it 
is more or less the case in our time that necromancy, witch- 
craft, the mediumistic art, has been practiced with immoral 
effects. Therefore, in the economy of Moses, which was 
to redeem the people of Israel, and bring them upon the 
plane of reason, this was a very wise enactment, though 
men have made light of it as meddling with an inconse- 
quent, insignificant thing. 

" Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any 
marks upon you : I am Jehovah." 

We know what the custom was — especially among zealots, 
or enthusiasts. We know how they would disfigure them- 
selves. We know how they used to cut their bodies with 
stones. We know how it was oftentimes carried to perma- 
nent dismemberment. And the enactment of Moses, which 
required men to regard their bodies as sacred, and not to 
be wantonly disfigured in the mummer}^ of pagan rites, 
was very humane, though it has been subject to ridicule. 

" Thou shalt rise up before the hoary head, and honor the face of the 
old man, and fear thy God." 

The child that is not taught to reverence his parents in 
the family will not reverence the magistrate out of the 
family ; and the child that has no reverence for the magis- 
trate will never reverence God. The way to reverence God 
is to practice reverence among the people with whom we 
dwell. The way to worship God whom we have not seen 
is to show consideration toward those in the midst of 
whom we move. When you take even these minute com- 
mands, and see what the objects of them were, and what 
the prevailing circumstances were, they rise from insig- 
nificance and triviality, and become important factors of 
education. All these and many other things carry in them 
the fundamental idea which Moses sought to inculcate 
among the people of Israel — namely, the idea of separation 



MOSAIC IXSTITUTES: SOCIAL OBSERVANCE. 289 

from the lieatlien peoples about them. Again and again 
and again he endeavored to impress them with the thought 
that they were a peculiar people — a people separated from 
the world. They were to be reminded of it by their clothes, 
by their industr}^, by everything that went on in the house 
and in the field, as well as in the worship of the sanctuary. 
Look, for instance, in Deuteronomy, the twenty-second 
chapter, at the commands that are given there : — 

"The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither 
shall a man put on a woman's garment : for all that do so are abomination 
unto Jehovah thy God." 

We all know that it is becoming a custom of every nation 
that men and women shall dress differently, not only for 
convenience, but because it prom-Otes morality. There 
was a special reason for this in Moses' time, -because in 
many of the neighboring nations the idolatrous worship 
required change and interchange of dress. This v/as the 
case in the later worship of Bacchus, and some of the most 
eminent historical characters figured in it. But there was 
something else ; the idea of national separation was all the 
time carried foward in that matter, also. 

"Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds : lest the fruit of thy 
seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard, be defiled. Thou 
shalt not plow with an ox and an ass together. Thou shalt not wear a gar- 
ment of divers sorts, as of woolen and linen together." 

Those look like sumptuary laws, insignificant, this re- 
quiring of separateness, things of a kind being kept by 
themselves, and things different not being allowed to be 
promiscuously mixed ; barley, for instance, being kept with 
barley, and wheat with wheat, contrary to the practice of 
.modern times, when a farmer mixes various kinds of grass 
and other seeds in the sowing. Among the Jews there 
was the idea that seeds must be kept separate one from 
another, as they, being a peculiar people, must be separated 
from all other peoples. They were not allowed to twist 
together woolen and linen ; not because it was cheaper, 
not because there was any intrinsic unfitness in their being 
19 



290 BIBLE STUDIES. 

united, but because everything must be held to its original 
simplicity, as it were, to signify and constantly enforce 
the separation of the people Israel. 

So in their husbandry, in the maniffactures of the loom, 
in the very dresses they wore, in all the economy of life, 
there were these silent indications, these little witnesses, 
saying to the Israelites, " Ye are a peculiar people, sepa- 
rated from every other. Ye are not Ammonites, or Amo- 
rites, or Jebusites, or Hivites ; ye are not of Egypt, or 
Canaan, or Assyria, or Babylon ; ye are a people consecrated 
and brought up of God to be a peculiar people, that in you 
should be developed a righteousness that by and by shall 
break forth as a sun, and shine to the uttermost parts of 
the earth." 

Now, when you consider what a crude people the Hebrews 
were, and how they would be tempted to take on their neigh- 
bors' manners and customs, and mix with other nations, 
you will perceive that there was much substantial impor- 
tance attaching to these signs and symbols, though to us 
they seem very insignificant if we read about them without 
recollecting that that childish, unformed people were being 
developed in moral sense, and that they were being so 
trained that they should be made sensitive to right and 
wrong. One of the functions of the Mosaic economy was 
to unfold the conscience. In this day, by force of long 
culture in Christian households, children are to a large 
extent born with innate tendencies toward right and away 
from wrong ; and certainly with these tendencies it is 
easier to lead them in true courses than would otherwise 
be the case. We had a good start at birth ; we came from 
a thoroughbred stock : but the question is, '' How shall 
men who began low down, and whose appetites are ani- 
mal, be led to be heedful and aspiring ? How shall they 
be taught to discriminate between right and wrong? How 
shall they be helped to fortify themselves against the evil 
influences by which they are surrounded ? That is the 
profound problem which Moses endeavored to solve ; and 
the peculiar training to which he subjected the Jews had a 



MOSAIC INSTITUTES: SOCIAL OBSERVANCE. 291 

constant tendency to broaden their knowledge of right and 
wrong, of purity and impurity. 

Turn to the eleventh chapter of Leviticus. I shall not 
read all the chapters bearing on this subject, but I will 
take from the eleventh enough to give an insight into the 
economy of Moses. 

" Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, These are the beasts which 
ye shall eat among all the beasts that are on the earth. Whatsoever parteth 
the hoof, and is cloven-footed, and cheweth the cud, among the beasts, that 
shall ye eat. Nevertheless, these shall ye not eat of them that chew the 
cud, or of them that divide the hoof : as the camel, because he cheweth 
the cud, but divideth not the hoof ; he is unclean unto you. And the coney, 
because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof ; he is unclean unto 
you. And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; 
he is unclean unto you. And the swine, though he divide the hoof, and be 
cloven-footed, yet he cheweth not the cud ; he is unclean to you. Of their 
flesh shall ye not eat, and their carcass shall ye not touch ; they are unclean 
to you. 

" These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters : whatsoever hath fins and 
scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat. And 
all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that 
move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall 
be an abomination unto you : they shall be even an abomination unto you ; 
ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcasses in abomina- 
tion. Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abom- 
ination unto you. 

"And these are they which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls; 
they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination : the eagle, and the ossi- 
frage, and the ospray, and the vulture, and the kite after his kind ; every 
raven after his kind ; and the owl, and the night-hawk, and the cuckoo, and 
the hawk after his kind, and the little owl, and the cormorant, and the great 
owl, and the swan, and the pelican, and the gier eagle, and the stork, the 
heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat. All fowls that creep, 
going upon all four, shall be an abomination unto you. 

" Yet these may ye eat of every flying creeping thing that goeth upon all 
four, which have legs above their feet, to leap withal upon the earth; even 
these of them ye may eat ; the locust after his kind, and the bald locust after 
his kind, and the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind. 
But all other flying creeping things, which have four feet, shall be an 
abomination unto you. And for these ye shall be unclean: whosoever 
toucheth the carcass of them shall be unclean until the even. And whoso- 
ever beareth aught of the carcass of them shall wash his clothes, and be 
unclean until the even." 

In the first place, it is a matter striking in the economy 



292 BIBLE STUDIES. 

of Moses that the health of the people was looked after. 
We have no medical treatise that is more minutely careful 
in regard to the securing of ventilation and the removal of 
miasma than were the provisions of the Mosaic common- 
wealth. And as to articles clean and unclean, although 
we may eat some that were proscribed by Moses, in the 
main the beasts and birds that he prohibited have not 
been eaten by civilized men, and have not been regarded 
as wholesome food. Men do not generally care to eat the 
horse and the zebra. Everywhere men eat the elk and the 
ox. The eating of swine's flesh was forbidden by Moses. 
We are to bear in mind that in the climate in which the 
Israelites dwelt oily meat could not be eaten with the same 
impunity that it can in colder regions ; so too with fish 
not having scales, like the bull-pout and the eel, they are 
oily and indigestible, and, like the forbidden birds of prey, 
they feed upon carrion. Thus there was a reason for their 
not eating certain kinds of food, beyond the question of 
ceremonial cleanness or uncleanness. 

And the matter of uncleanness was sometimes carried to 
a remarkable degree. If a dead insect fell into a dish for 
the table, that dish must not be eaten, just as with us if a 
cockroach gets into a plate of food, the whole has to go. 
In our modern restaurants they would take out the cock- 
roach and give you the food, I prefer to board with 
Moses. According to the Mosaic prescription, if a man 
bore a pitcher of water, and a dead insect fell into it, he 
must break the pitcher as well as throw away the water. 
This was no hardship, considering the sort of pitchers they 
had in the early days. It might seem otherwise in our 
modern times of exquisite ceramic ware. In those days a 
broken pitcher was no loss, because one could be made in 
ten minutes. 

There were cases in which the law against handling un- 
clean things was enforced to a singular extent. If a man 
was made unclean by touching a dead body, anyone that he 
touched was unclean ; and anyone that he touched was also 
unclean ; and so on. There were four degrees of unclean- 



MOSAIC IXSTirUTES: SOCIAL OBSERVANCE. 293 

ness by successive contacts. Such was the lengtli to which 
the Mosaic system carried this matter ; but it was all in 
the direction of compelling carefulness and punishing care- 
lessness, as children are trained at school. 

I will not go further in this direction to-night. I do not 
desire to weary you with extended commentaries on the 
economy of Moses ; and this evening's discourse has been 
intended only to illustrate the general principle underlying 
its many regulations — the necessity of separating Israel 
from surrounding nations, and of impressing their un- 
tutored natures with precept upon precept of wisdom 
enforced by line upon line of minute observance. 

I will close, to-night by calling your attention to a 
dramatic scene in the history of this people to which I 
alluded in an earlier discourse. When you consider what 
an uncultivated and naturally imaginative and supersti- 
tious people they were, you will recognize how striking 
that drama must have been. I need not go back to the 
grandeur and unsurpassable sublimity of that spectacle 
wherein the great congregation of Israel, in an oasis of the 
desert, came to a narrow plain at the foot of Mount Sinai, 
and saw the flame and heard the Voice when Moses re- 
ceived the law at the hands of Majesty. That the impres- 
sion produced by this exhibition must have been very 
powerful is shown by the fact that from time immemorial 
writers have striven to adequately picture it. 

There was another scene which, though of a different 
character, was as full of sublime grandeur as that. Moses 
ordained that when all the statutes which he had developed 
liad been practiced by the children of Israel in their wan- 
derings until they came to the border of the promised land, 
so soon as they had gone over the Jordan, the law should 
be ratified by the acclamation of the people, and under 
circumstances which should indelibly impress its sanctity 
upon their minds. Crossing the Jordanbefore Jericho, and 
passing over the plains of Mamre, they came to two moun- 
tains — that at the north, Ebal, and that at the south, Ger- 
izim, with a valley between them. It was here that the 



294 BIBLE STUDIES. 

ceremonies took place which are described in the twenty- 
seventli chapter of Deuteronom}'- : — 

"And Moses with the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, 
Keep all the commandments which I command you this day. And it shall 
be on the day when ye shall pass over Jordan unto the land which Jehovah 
thy God giveth thee, that thou shalt set thee up great stones, and plaster 
them with plaster [that being the way in which they wrought] : and thou 
shalt write upon them all the words of this law [the Ten Commandments], 
when thou art passed over, that thou mayest go in unto the land which Je- 
hovah thy God giveth thee, a land that fioweth with milk and honey ; as Je- 
hovah God of thy fathers hath promised thee. Therefore it shall be when 
ye be gone over Jordan, that ye shall set up these stones, which I command 
you this day, in Mount Ebal, and thou shalt plaster them with plaster. 
And there shalt thou build an altar unto Jehovah thy God, an altar of 
stones : thou shalt not lift up any iron tool upon them. Thou shalt build 
the altar of Jehovah thy God of wdiole stones : and thou shalt offer burnt 
offerings thereon unto Jehovah thy God : and thou shalt offer peace offer- 
ings, and shalt eat there, and rejoice before Jehovah thy God. And thou 
shalt write upon the stones all the words of this law very plainly. 

"And Moses and the priests the Levites spake unto all Israel, saying, 
Take heed, and hearken, O Israel ; this day thou art become the people of 
Jehovah thy God. Thou shalt therefore obey the voice of Jehovah thy 
God, and do his commandments and his statutes, which I command thee this 
day. And Moses charged the people the same day, saying, These shall 
stand upon Mount Gerizim to bless the people, when ye are come over Jor- 
dan ; Simeon, and Levi, and Judah, and Issachar, and Joseph, and Benjamin, 
[the favorite ones ; the beautiful natures] : and these shall stand upon Mount 
Ebal to curse; Reuben, Gad, and Asher, and Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali." 

When all things were prepared, at a signal from the 
priests, the blessings and the curses that attended the ful- 
fillment or the violation of the law of God were uttered, and 
were echoed from one mountain to the other. 

"And the Levites shall speak, and say unto all the men of Israel with a 
loud voice. Cursed be the man that maketh any graven or molten image, 
an abomination unto Jehovah, the work of the hands of the craftsman, and 
putteth it in a secret place." 

And so soon as the echo of that had died away, the whole 
congregation of people on Ebal and Gerizim, and all that 
were between, with a sound like that of many waters, cried 
OMi, A 7?ie7t I And from Mount Gerizim on the other side 
came the corresponding blessing to those tliat worshiped 
the one true God. Then the whole people gave out the 



MOSAIC IXSTITUTES: SOCIAL Ol^SERrAXCE. 29^ 

response, Aiiieii! Then Mount Ebal thundered back anothcr 
curse. Then Gerizim sent forth another blessing. So 
these gigantic mountains answered each other witli curses 
and blessings like echoes in the storms of the Alps, re- 
sounding from peak to peak. And finally the vast assem- 
bly dispersed. 

Thus was ratified, in a manner than which there could 
have been none more impressive upon the imagination 
and the senses, the law promulgated by Moses, the people 
invoking upon themselves the curses of disobedience and 
the blessings of obedience. It was the carrying out of 
that economy which was meant to bring the children of 
Israel up from barbarism and idolatry to civilization and 
the worship of Jehovah. It was a ceremony so striking 
and so sublime that it could never die out of the memory, 
and could never cease to elevate the imagination of those 
who were participants in it. 

I bear witness that, though it be professionally my busi- 
ness to study the Word of God, the more I read and ponder 
the contents of the Old Testament the m.ore are my admi- 
ration and reverence for that book increased ; and those 
who have not found this to be so should give more atten- 
tion to that, book as a means of better understanding the 
New Testament. 

In the West, a venerable preacher who drew very much 
of his instruction from the Old Testament was called to 
order in a council of ministers for placing too much stress 
upon the Old Testament Avritings. They told him he 
should preach more from the New Testament and less 
from the Old. " Brethren," said he, '' I am a soldier, and I 
find that the way to make a good shot is to draw the fore- 
sight through the hindsight. By my experience I am 
convinced that if in preaching a minister would make a 
good shot, he can do it best by drawing the foresight of 
the New Testament through the hindsight of the Old. In 
that way he can be more sure that he is giving his people 
the real Word of God." And my own belief is that, 
though the Old Testament is to be read with discrim.ina- 



296 BIBLE STUDIES. 

tion, and in the light of the knowledge that has accumu- 
lated about it during tlie ages that have passed since it 
was written, 3^ou will find within the lids of that book 
honey in the honey-comb. There are rude places in it ; 
but as travelers through deserts and over mountains here 
and there find sweet little valleys, so in reading the Old 
Testament you wdll find exquisite histories, beautiful scenes, 
and profound wisdom, such as are not contained in any 
other literature on the globe. 



XVI. 
THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 



" Go ye up unto this feast : I go not up yet unto this feast ; for my time 
is not yet full come. When he had said these words unto them, he abode 
still in Galilee. But when his brethren were gone up, then went he also 
up unto the feast, not openly, but as it were in secret." — Jno. vii. 8-10. 



This was the Feast of Tabernacles, as we are informed 
in the second verse of this chapter. The continued exist- 
ence and flourishing of the great feasts of the Jews are 
indicated by this passage from the life of our Saviour, not 
only, but by others showing his interest in them, and his 
observance of them. We shall have occasion, this evening, 
in going on with our account of the Mosaic economy, to 
pay attention to the development and offices of these great 
annual festivals of the Jews ; but, before this, a word upon 
the sacrifices that formed the worship and ministration of 
the priesthood and the Levitical order. 

On few subjects has there been so much discussion to so 
little purpose as on the origin and meaning of the sacri- 
fices — the Divine Offerings, as they are perhaps more fitly 
called in the Old Testament. Sacrifices or offerings have 
belonged to every nation and tribe on the globe. It may 
suffice to remark, in a general way, that they represented 
the efforts of men to conciliate their gods. They existed 
long before the time of Moses. They were known to the 
patriarchs. They were known and practiced in the land 
from which the patriarchs came out. They were common 
to all the nations around about. 

The development of the sacrificial system varied in 



Sunday evening, March i, 1879. I-ksson : Psa. xcvii. 



298 BIBLE STUDIES. 

different lands — in Egypt, in Chaldea, in Persia, and in 
Syria ; their diversities were almost as great as those of the 
languages and customs themselves ; but there was this 
common root in them — namely, conciliation ; access to the 
reigning invisible powers ; offerings of placation ; testi- 
monials of devotion, of reverence or honor. From that 
simple beginning they were differentiated ; and in the 
Mosaic system it was sought by sacrifices to attach to 
almost every one of the interests of life associations of 
its relation to the ruling power of the nation — Jehovah. 
There was scarcely a thing in the person, in the family, in 
the grain that sprang from the ground, in the fruit that 
grew in the vineyard, in anything that belonged to them 
in the nature of prosperity or of wealth, that in one Vv^ay 
or another was not, by being offered solemnly and relig- 
iously, made to bear a relation in their thought to the 
overruling God. In the Tabernacle, and afterwards more 
signally in the Temple, the sacrifices or offerings were so 
organized that their observance should honor and rever- 
ence God. 

Whether or not the modern argument derived from the 
great sacrifice of Christ and the atoning power of his suf- 
fering and death are legitimately deduced from the Jew- 
ish ideas I will not undertake to say. I will say simply 
this : that modern thought has not made allowance enough 
for the real thought of antiquity, and that into the sacri- 
fices that are celebrated in the Old Testament, and that 
had their fulfillment and completion in the Lord Jesus 
Christ, we have injected a modern element of thought that 
did not exist among the orthodox Jews of the old dispen- 
sation. 

Their sacrifices were official — that is, while it was the 
common business of members of the family to make offer- 
ings to God, the more solemn offerings were made through 
the ministration of the priests. 

You will recollect that there was one tribe set apart for 
the services of the sanctuar}^ The Levites and the priests 
did not represent in the ancient economy what the priest- 



THE I'EAS'r OF TABERXACLE^. 299 

hood does in our day. Priests in modern economy are an 
instructed class, for administration in religious and moral 
thought and service. While they were yet in the wilder- 
ness the Levites and the priests were really the standing 
army of the Jews ; and throughout the greater part of 
their national existence the office of the priest was far 
more nearly allied to that of the butcher than to that of 
the orator, or expositor, or preacher. Moreover, the greatest 
generals of the nation were drawn from the priestly or- 
der. The Levites were the defending power. They were 
the military centers. Whenever the armies were arrayed 
for offense or defense they were headed by their Levitical 
officers. When the sacrifices were offered up in the Tem- 
ple, although there w^ere prayers, and chants, and various 
other solemnities by others, yet the blood-offerings were 
made by the Levites. There were offerings of grain, and 
fruits, and frankincense, and what not, which they did not 
direct ; but when bullocks, and goats, and lambs, and turtle 
doves were to be sacrificed, these were offered up through 
the Levites, or the priesthood. 

If you will read the account of the dedication of the 
Temple of Solomon, you will see what a business it was. 
It is scarcely possible for our modern imagination not to 
be shocked at the scenes of blood which must needs have 
taken place every year, two or three times, in connection 
with the sacrificial rites of the Jews. 

We cannot conceive of a service of that kind in which, in 
succession, bullocks and lambs were knocked down, and 
the priests stood by to take the blood that flowed from the 
necks of these animals. Literally, a whole river of blood 
ran, in these sacrifices, through days and days. The huge 
abattoirs in some of our towns are inadequate to represent 
w^hat took place in those early times. The slaughter of 
hundreds of thousands of animals in the great sacrificial 
service of the Temple is so barren to every conception we 
have, that we can scarcely go back to-day in our thought 
and gain any realization of the scenes that were enacted 
then. 



3O0 BIBLE STUDIES. 

With us, blood means death; we have hardly a single 
conception, that is not artificial, which gives us any pleas- 
ant association in regard to these things. But to the Jews 
they had pleasant associations. "The blood is the ///"<?," 
said Moses. Blood, as the universal symbol of life, was 
connected with their deepest thoughts and most sacred feel- 
ings. Here is a gulf between them and us. 

Now, although the priests ministered somewhat in in- 
struction, although some of them read the Psalms, or the 
Law, yet the great body of them were men of robust 
strength, stalwart, lusty, who could wield the battle-axe, 
or the butcher's axe, as the case might be ; and they stood 
almost as far apart as it is possible to conceive of their 
standing from the priesthood as it is organized in modern 
times and as it exists in our Roman Catholic and Episcopal 
churches. In the Presbyterian, the Congregational, the 
Baptist, and other churches there is no priesthood. These 
churches have a ministry, not a priesthood, and they are 
exempt from many of the vexations and perplexities which 
belong to a priesthood. It would seem as though it would be 
a very dangerous thing to have introduced into a common- 
wealth a whole tribe of privileged men that stood between 
the people and God, and that therefore substantially owned 
the national conscience ; but experience shows that per- 
haps in this case less harm flowed from it than ever before 
or since. It is notorious that the priesthood, the world 
around, has had a supremacy over the imaginations, the 
fears, and the consciences of men, and that, too, through 
the instrumentality of elements taken up and augmented 
by worldly ambition and organization. But this inheres in 
the nature of things. It is the tendency of human nature 
to look up, to aspire ; and any man that officially represents, 
or any class of men that represent, higher conceptions of 
life and duty than the average will draw to them the 
thoughts and the reverence of the masses of mankind. It 
cannot be helped ; and oftentimes persons will receive 
homage when individually they may be unworthy of it ; 
for, with all the gravitation that there is in man's passions 



THE FEAST OF TABEKXACLES. 301 

toward evil, there is also a struggle, feeble or strong as the 
case may be, of the divine principle in human nature, 
toward light and purity and elevation, and thus toward 
what stands for those loftier aims. 

In general, according to the civilization and knowledge 
of the globe, the priesthood represent the best elements of 
human nature, and strive to draw people up to those ele- 
ments ; but when they are organized as a class, with 
peculiar privileges, when they gather wealth to themselves, 
and when political power comes into their hands as well, 
then they become a very dangerous class. It is dangerous 
in a great community to have any class which is immovable, 
and in which there is no circulation from the bottom to 
the top. 

Now, the Levites had no possessions. They had places 
appointed for them, but it does not appear that they took 
possession of many of them. They were made to be de- 
pendent upon the voluntary contributions of the people. 
Tithes were the support on which they lived, and it was a 
very moderate support. And they never, in history, grew 
to be a rich or a dangerous class. One striking fact is that 
these priests, especially if they were high priests, even if 
they were most degenerate, were dear to the people — to 
the common people — and were regarded as in some sense 
of them, among them, and belonging to them. The Leyit- 
ical economy was not one that separated the priests from 
the people in such a way that they lost sympathy with 
them. On the other hand, tliere was a feeling of mutual 
companionship. 

I pass, now, to the discussion of some other elements of 
this great enginery of the commonwealth of Israel which 
have not received, it seems to me, that consideration which 
really belongs to them. There v/ere three gre^t festivals 
appointed by Moses, which, although they were inter- 
mitted, and although they lapsed at times, were in exist- 
ence down to the time of our Lord, and after the city of 
Jerusalem was broken up by the Romans and the Jewish 
people were scattered. The first of these was the Feast of 



303 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the Passover, the second was the Pentecost, and the third 
was the Feast of the Tabernacles. 

The Feast of the Passover was designed to commemo- 
rate and to bear with it the whole breadth of the moral 
instruction which belonged to the sublime providence of 
God by which, when the firstborn of Egypt were de- 
stroyed, the destroying angel passed over the places where 
his chosen ones lived and saved them. It became an 
ordinance in Israel that every year, upon an appointed 
day, there should be a memorable and solemn convoca- 
tion of the people, and that this should be the general 
ground and reason of it. The sacrifices, the songs and 
chants, the various emblematical services, were arranged 
around about that historic center. 

Then, counting fifty days or seven weeks from the Pass- 
over, came the Feast of the Pentecost {the Fiftieth). That 
was more in the nature of a Thanksgiving, and celebration 
of the in-gathering, for it represented the nation in the act 
of bringing the first fruits of all the products of the field, 
and offering them up at the hands of tiie priests as a testi- 
mon}^ of thanks to God. 

Later on, in October, when they had gathered their 
grapes, their olives, their figs, and their latest fruits of the 
field, came the Feast of Tabernacles. This last, however, 
had a prior or larger historical element than the Pentecost, 
in that it celebrated the residence of the people in the 
wilderness, when they had no fields to sow^, no pasturage, 
no oil, no wine, no vineyards. 

If the Passover was the most solemn and profoundly 
religious, the Feast of Tabernacles was by all odds the 
most convivial and joyous of these three feasts. The Feast 
of the Passover occupied seven days, the Feast of the 
Pentecost one day, and the Feast of Tabernacles eight 
days. 

By and by there was a fourth festival added, which was 
in full operation in tlie time of the apostles — namely, the 
Feast of Purim, established by Mordecai on account of 
the escape of the Jews from the persecutions of Haman in 



THE FEAST OF TABERXACLES. 303 

Persia. This feast did not belong to the trio appointed by 
the Mosaic laws. There were other great festivals and 
fasts. I pass these all by, and confine my attention to the 
three great feasts established by the institutes of Moses. 

It was in accordance with the ordinance of Moses that 
at these three periods every male whose age and condition 
would permit, should go up to the Tabernacle (or to Jeru- 
salem after the Temple had been established), leaving their 
possessions and so much of their families as were to re- 
main behind, but taking their families, even including 
their little children, if they pleased. Three times a year 
the whole nation rose up, as it were, to its feet, formed 
vast caravans, and proceeded to the appointed place. Mul- 
titudes came from the north and the upper line of Galilee 
down by the western shore of that sea. They came from 
the northwest, crossing the plain of Esdraelon, meeting 
just below the Sea of Galilee, crossed over Jordan, and 
went down on a better caravan road on the eastern side, 
as far as Jericho, a little above the point where the Jordan 
empties into the Dead Sea, and thence, recrossing the river, 
passed on to Jerusalem. And in approaching Jerusalem 
when near to Bethany they came to a most resplendent 
view. 

Those that lived in the mountainous country came from 
the west. And from various directions came those that 
were in the southern and western parts. These had but 
two or three days' journey ; but those in the extreme north 
made the distance in four, five, and six days, according to 
whether there were women and children among them, or 
whether they were all robust men. 

From the moment of their starting until their return, the 
whole nation was one vast singing-school. They were 
perpetually chanting songs to Jehovah. On departing 
from their homes they left behind them houses, farms, 
cattle, horses, even their little children, — for usually it 
was not till the age of twelve that children were taken up 
to the feasts ; and thousands, tens of thousands especially 
at evening, as they settled down in their picnic camps, 



304 BIBLE STUDIES. 

would be heard to join in these songs ; and among tlie 
voices of the multitude might be distinguished those of 
children and trembling old men. How well their tender 
thoughts and feelings were expressed by such a Psalm as 
this :— 

" I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. 
My help cometh from the Lord, w^hich made heaven and earth. He will 
not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber. 
Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is 
thy keeper : the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not 
smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee 
from all evil : he shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going 
out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore." 

How beautiful, that those who took this journey trusted 
to the Lord all that they left behind which was dear to 
them ! For, as you will bear in mind, it was the promise 
of God that if they would keep his commandments and 
observe his ordinances when they went to these feasts he 
would withhold their enemies so that they should not 
attack their homes in their absence — a promise which was 
kept. I shall resume, a little later, some account of the use 
of the Psalms on this journey. 

Look, for a moment, at what the effect must have been 
of these great annual migrations by which, from end to 
end of Palestine, the whole people were taken out of their 
regular habits. It does men good to take them out of 
their habits — to drive them out of the store and make 
them forget it ; to^draw them away from their offices, and 
cause them to think of something else besides their toil. 
It would do a world of good, if, two or three times a year, 
every housekeeper could make a pilgrimage, and forget 
tubs, kneading troughs, the cares of home — if now and 
then she could, as it were, be sent out to grass. And con- 
sider what an effect it must have had upon that whole 
nation to have the family care very much surceased — to 
have everybody, on every side, fall into line in neighborly 
ways, and walk one, two, three, four, five days, to Jerusa- 
lem, spend there a week, and then go back, three or four 
weeks being utterly broken up from the associations of the 



THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 305 

household. What chance could there have been for care 
to plow furrows on the brows of such folks ? It is a good 
thing once in a while to intermit cultivation, let the soil 
rest, and allow the rain to beat upon it, and the light and 
air to come into it ; and it is a good thing to break up the 
monotony of life, and let in relaxation where there is con- 
stant, solid employment. 

So it was, in a very simple and natural manner, with the 
Israelites ; these pilgrimages gave them elasticity, and 
even relieved labor from its toilsomeness : for you must 
bear in mind that slaves under such circumstances had the 
privileges of their masters. They were not to be debarred 
from the enjoyment of these festivities. The stranger him- 
self was also permitted to partake of them. 

Consider what is the condition of the oppression-bound 
countries of Europe. How ignorant they are ! How un- 
elastic they are ! How mechanical they are ! How nar- 
row their ideas are ! If you contrast them with the versa- 
tile, active, energetic, all-sided Yankees of this country, 
that travel incessantly, that are alert, day and night, all 
over the land, you will see what might be effected by a 
provision of this kind among a people like the children of 
Israel. 

Then, it was the beginning of a peripatetic education. 
It was not the Greeks alone that instructed men while 
they were walking. The Israelites, in conversation by the 
way, taught the people, both old and young. Much of the 
intercourse of neighbors with neighbors on the road was 
in the nature of academic instruction. Have you never 
heard men that lived in the country, after returning from 
large towns where they had been on market days, tell what 
they had seen, what they had done, and what others had 
done ? I remember hearing an old farmer of Massachu- 
setts in whose family I was interested, on his coming back 
from Boston, give an account of having heard Dr. Lyman 
Beecher preach a sermon. He described the congregation, 
and told what the text was, how the sermon was divided, 

and how the subject was treated ; and I never shall forget 
20 



3o6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

how the children sat around and listened to all these 
things. And consider how much two or three million peo- 
ple, going together to Jerusalem, and attending the Feast 
of Tabernacles, and returning, would have to talk about. 
Consider how eager they would be, in mixing their com- 
panies as they did, to tell one another what had happened 
in their town, in their province, or in their neighborhood. 
With a week of journeying on their hands, they would 
have time to unfold all the news there was ; and it could 
not be but that they would enjoy opportunities for educa- 
tion, and derive larger conceptions o'f what was going on 
around about them. It was a substitute, in some sense, for 
modern newspapers — for everybody found out what no- 
body had any business to know. Everybody heard every 
rumor that had been circulated in any neighborhood about 
anybody. They had nothing to do but to talk over such 
things, and they generally talked. The cases were dis- 
cussed of the man who had gone up and of the man who 
had gone down ; of the persons who had died, and of the 
persons who had got married ; of those who had failed, of 
those who had cheated, and of those who had performed 
honorable deeds. These and many other subjects relating 
to men and things, as well as the weightier matters of the 
Law, would naturally be made topics of conversation on 
the road and during the time that was spent in Jerusalem, 
by the vast multitudes that gathered there on these occa- 
sions. After being there seven days they would go back 
pretty full of news again, and undoubtedly they kept one 
another well "posted." 

This may seem to have been not altogether desirable ; 
but it is very desirable to keep people stirring, and to keep 
them interested and excited about something. There is 
nothing so bad for human nature as stupid, sodden indif- 
ference, although there are different degrees of merit in 
excitement ; but the prime condition of the benefit of men 
is that they shall be excited ; and surely the Israelites were 
kept wide-awake. 

Besides, you are to bear in mind that these great migra- 



THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES. 307 

tions were a means of keeping family ties bright. If, on the 
one hand, they promoted the worship of the invisible God, 
on the other hand they enhanced in the minds of the Jewish 
people the sanctity of the family. As I have said before, 
I consider the power of the family among the Israelites as 
being the saving element in their earthly nationality. That 
which has carried them through the flood of persecution to 
which they have been subjected has been their conception 
of the family. This conception has come down to us ; and 
we are indebted in this respect more largely to the Israel- 
ites than to any other nation, or than to all other nations 
on the globe. 

Now, in this periodical migration of the people, on their 
return the}^ were undoubtedly met by neighbors and rela- 
tives who remained behind, and it is presumed that they 
came together and indulged in social amenities such as 
we enjoy on Christmas and Thanksgiving days. We can 
readily understand that they had ample opportunities to 
learn about each other when we bear in mind that they 
were able three times a 3^ear to make these pilgrimages. 
It was a wonderful element in keeping bright the fire of 
the family altar of love. 

Then consider, again, how, under such circumstances, 
the feeling of patriotism would be kindled. They wor- 
shiped, not only, but they worshiped under forms that 
brought to memory the great events of their history. 
Those feasts were not like the roaring Fourth of July 
celebrations of our Independence, where we substitute 
noise for brains — nothing of that kind. In their magnifi- 
cent psalms they chanted on the road the events of their 
history. But the structure of the psalms must be borne 
in mind. They are in a form that is adapted to pronun- 
ciation and response by answering choirs. I have heard 
persons complain of antiphonal singing, with choirs stand- 
ing over against each other in church and answering one 
another, as new fangled ; but such singing is older than 
hymns. It seems to belong to the childhood of all nations. 
They have that kind of singing on plantations in the South. 



3o8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

One man sings, and then comes the chorus of all the rest. 
And the Israelites, on the way to Jerusalem as well as dur- 
ing the festive days, were accustomed to chant their songs 
in that manner. 

Let us consider, for instance, the one hundred and thirty- 
fifth and the one hundred and thirty-sixth Psalms : — 

" Praise Jehovah. Praise ye the name of Jehovah ; praise him, O ye 
servants of Jehovah. Ye that stand in the house of Jehovah, in the courts 
of the house of our God, praise Jehovah ; for Jehovah is good." 

The response would come, like thunder, — 

"Sing praises unto his name; for it is pleasant. For Jehovah hath 
chosen Jacob unto himself, and Israel for his peculiar treasure. For I 
know that Jehovah is great, and that our Jehovah is above all gods. AVhat- 
soever Jehovah pleased, that did he in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and 
all deep places. He causeth the vapors to ascend from the ends of the 
earth; he maketh lightnings for the rain ; he bringeth the wind out of his 
treasuries : who smote the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and beast : who 
sent tokens and wonders into the midst of thee, O Egypt, upon Pharaoh, 
and upon all his servants : who smote great nations, and slew mighty kings." 

There is something grand in this, when you consider that 
vast multitude coming, in various bands, from every direc- 
tion, meeting, and with endless reverberating song chant- 
ing, day and evening, the great events of their national 
history. 

" Who smote great nations, and slew mighty kings ; Sihon king of the 
Amorites, and Og king of Bashan, and all the kingdoms of Canaan : and 
gave their land for an heritage, an heritage unto Israel his people. Thy name, 
O Jehovah, endureth forever ; and thy memorial, O Jehovah, throughout all 
generations. For Jehovah will judge his people, and he will repent himself 
concerning his servants. The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the 
work of men's hands. 

" They have mouths, but they speak not ; eyes have they, but they see 
not ; they have ears, but they hear not; n-either is there any breath in their 
mouths. They that make them are like unto them : so is every one that 
trusteth in them. 

"Bless Jehovah, O house of Israel : bless Jehovah, O house of Aaron : 
bless Jehovah, O house of Levi : ye that fear Jehovah, bless Jehovah. 
Blessed be Jehovah out of Zion, which dwelleth at Jerusalem. Praise ye 
Jehovah." 

Not one of these Psalms, but scores and scores of thetn, 
were perfectly familiar, residing in the memory of those 



THE FEAST OF TABERXACLES. 309 

great crowds, and were chanted by them all the way up to 
Jerusalem and back again. Thus the little children learned 
the songs, learned the history of the nation, learned the 
names of the Israelitish heroes, and coupled these patriotic 
themes with the ministration of divine providence, so that 
their religion had in it the most profound moral sensibili- 
ties. 

Then this mingling of the people in their upward march 
and in their return broke up the tendency to tribal nar- 
rowness and sectionalism, in a manner that we scarcely 
should have anticipated. They were mixed together. They 
formed pleasing acquaintances on the road — for they dwelt 
separately. The law of property was such that the inherit- 
ance of each tribe was kept with that tribe ; and the 
marriage laws were such that the property reverted to the 
tribe, no matter to whom the possessor was married ; but 
this tribal exclusiveness was met and modified by the three- 
fold mixture, every year, of the people who swarmed along 
the great highways and camped about Jerusalem. 

When they once had arrived at Jerusalem they were to 
abide there from one to two weeks. Josephus, speaking of 
one occasion, says there were three millions of people that 
had come up to Jerusalem at the time of the Roman 
invasion and the besieging of the city. The number seems 
so great that many have doubted it ; yet, when you come 
to make an estimate, the number must be counted by mil- 
lions ; and you may as well say three millions as two 
millions ; for, if two millions could have been taken care 
of, three millions could have been. If such large multi- 
tudes were looked after during the passage through the 
Wilderness, they could also be cared for during their 
attendance at the Feast of Tabernacles ; especially as each 
family group largely took care of itself. 

Their manner of camping was very simple. All the hills 
around Jerusalem were clothed with people dwelling in 
booths, tents, or tabernacles. There they abode and ob- 
served various ceremonies of the Temple. The Temple itself 
occupied about a ten-acre space. Some of the ceremonies 



310 BIBLE STUDIES. 

were resplendent. The conditions imposed and the offices 
enjoined by the ritual, while they were in some respects 
superstitious and burdensome, in many other respects 
were spectacular, impressive, and * very powerful on the 
imagination. 

It was in connection with the Festival of w^hich we read 
in the Gospels — considered the greatest day of joy known 
to the Jewish people — that the old rabbis used to say, " He 
who has not been present at a Feast of the Tabernacles 
knows not what it is to be joyful." The people were car- 
ried to such a degree of exhilaration, and it was so socially 
contagious and infectious, that these three millions w^ere as 
good as mad for joy around about that old city. 

You are to bear in mind that the day was one of holy 
convocation. A portion of each day was set apart for 
solemn religious services, and the rest of the day was 
devoted to social conviviality. These things were ordered. 
Hospitality was a religious law. The people were com- 
manded to provide for the stranger, for the orphan, for 
the widow, and for the Levite. Their housekeeping was 
very simple. Their hospitality was a kind of friendly 
interchange. They occupied themselves a whole week in 
such social economy ; and this w^as interlaced, mixed up, 
with most solemn observances, led on by the priesthood. 
Can you conceive of anything that would appeal more 
strongly to the imagination of the Jews than these Feasts 
of the Tabernacles, and the customs and ceremonies which 
accompanied them ? There never was an educating sys- 
tem which compared with that of Moses in its various par- 
ticulars. 

There is another element that I want you to bear in 
mind. I do not know where you will find anywhere else a 
real provision for dancing in the ordinances of religion for 
the purpose of producing piety. To be sure there were 
single instances of the sort ; dancing was a religious serv- 
ice in Greece and Rome : but among the classic nations 
and other pagans it was a part of the most licentious rites. 
Where else can you find that to dance w^as to bring to 



THE FEAST OF TABERXACLES. 311 

mind a holy God ? That is not generally the association 
connected with dancing in our time ; but among the 
Hebrews dancing was made a part of the religious cere- 
monial in such a sense that it was allied to religious feel- 
ing ; and, moreover, religious feeling and the whole econ- 
omy of religion were to produce amusement, gratification, 
happiness, over and above that which came from mere 
religious instruction, from general social intercourse, or 
from home life. The economy of the Hebrew common- 
wealth was organized to produce happiness, as if it were a 
moral quality, and as if the production of it were worthy of 
the priesthood. 

The Puritans went into the Old Testament and borrowed 
from it profound conceptions of moral purity, of righteous- 
ness, and of the rigor of an executed law ; but the Puritans 
left behind them the sweet blossom of joy. The rounded- 
out fruit of this element they did not incorporate into 
their system — and for reasons that were very plain. Music, 
dancing, pictures, architecture, had been taken possession 
of by superstition ; and where there has been gross super- 
stition iconoclasm must follow. So the Puritans broke 
down all these fair and pleasant things. And we came 
from them. We came from the loins of New England, 
very largely, where men of granite were made — and they 
were men of granite, men of power, men of stability, foun- 
dation-men on whom could be built a commonwealth ; 
but men that had no moss, no vines, no beauty except the 
inherent beauty of moral grandeur. Their churches were 
all plain. There was no provision in them for amusement. 
The only amusement they had was that of going to church ; 
and that was not so amusing as one might suppose who 
did not know how the places of worship were built. 

I have a vivid recollection of what going to church was 
in my boyhood on Litchfield hill — especially in winter. It 
was a bleak place. The winds held jubilee. Tribes of 
winds repaired to that hill, not three times a year, but at 
all times of the year. And the church was in some respects 
a cheerless place. There was little or no provision for 



312 BIBLE STUDIES. 

comfort or for decoration. Beauty was a thing scarcely 
thouglit of. It was not sought to promote joy. The plan 
of procedure was quite unlike that of the Hebrew com- 
monwealth, which looked upon joy not simply as an accom- 
paniment to religion, but as part and parcel of it. The 
Jews sanctified joy, and made it serve the Lord. 

Wesley said that we had given our best songs and music 
to the devil, and that he thought it right to make reprisals 
and get them back again. To a large extent the church 
has lost its hold upon the imaginative and social elements 
of life, provision for which has been universally made in 
the constitution of m^en ; largely, religion has lost its hold 
upon them : but Moses, that wise old man of the desert, 
wrought them into his system ; and not only at these festi- 
vals, but elsewhere, the people were instructed to observe 
them. The people were made happy, they were kept happy, 
and happiness was inculcated as a duty. 

I think no one can understand the Psalms if he does not 
know how they were used on these and other great occa- 
sions. I have read one or two of them to you ; but con- 
sider for a moment what the effect would be in an ancient 
Jewish congregation if the minister should get up and 
read, "I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go unto 
the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand within thy 
gates, O Jerusalem." Even we do not need to hear that 
Psalm read a great many times in order to be deeply im- 
pressed by it ; but to any Hebrew gathering it was resplen- 
dent with associations. From the farthest north, the 
region of perpetual snows, groups, families, neighborhoods, 
had gathered themselves in preparation for the journey to 
Jerusalem ; at every path and road they had joined other 
bands ; thus the multitude steadily grew. There was the 
boy who had never before been to Jerusalem, but whose 
imagination had been fired by accounts of its magnifi- 
cence ; there was the maiden that walked, peradventure, 
by the side of him who was to be her husband ; there was 
the sturdy old father of eighty, who was proud to be able 
to say that he could do as much as any of his boys ; there 



THE FEAST OE 7\iB ERXACLES. 313 

was the mother who also kept her place in the company. 
And so they proceeded on their journey ; they went on, 
day and night, conversing and singing; they passed by 
the Jordan and Jericho. At last tliey caught a glimpse of 
the Temple ; and soon the city in all its glory stood before 
,them in the broad valley beneath. The morning sun was 
rising when they came to that scene, and the tears ran down 
their cheeks, while they chanted this Psalm : — 

" I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go unto the house of 
Jehovah. Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem 
is builded as a city that is compact together : whither the tribes go up, the 
tribes of Jehovah, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the name of 
Jehovah. For there are set thrones of judgment, the thrones of the house of 
David. Pray for the peace of Jerusalem : they shall prosper that love thee. 
Peace be within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces. For my 
brethren and companions' sakes, I will now say, Peace be within thee. 
Because of the house of Jehovah our God I will seek thy good." 

What a greeting was this ! And when it came from 
thousands — from millions — of people, how impressive it 
must have been ! And afterwards, when the joy had 
somewhat subsided, and the great multitude had had their 
various entertainments, and they stood singing some of 
these songs about the sections of the Temple in which the 
priests and Levites were gathered, — for it rose section 
upon section, court upon court, — standing near the great 
altar, imagine the priests giving out a verse of one of these 
Psalms ; and then, at a signal, the immense crowd, stretch- 
ing as far as the* eye could reach, down on one side and up 
on the other, giving back the response, all the horns and 
instruments sending forth a blast like the roll of thunder ; 
followed by the giving out by the priests and Levites 
another part of the parallelism, and at a second signal 
the vast multitude again responding in a voice like the 
sound of many waters. Is it strange that, under such 
circumstances, the people went home loving Jerusalem ? 
Is it strange that they were glad to go unto the house of 
the Lord ? Is it strange that, from time to time, they 
reassembled with enthusiasm at these feasts ? Is it strange 
that, under such discipline, their patriotism was stimu- 



314 BIBLE STUDIES. 

lated ? Is it strange that they learned to reverence God 
as they saw him manifested in the firmament, in the 
clouds, in the storm, in the earthquake, and the volcano ? 
Is it strange that beyond compare this people have been 
the most remarkable people on earth in the perpetuity of 
their characteristics and in the permanence of their insti- 
tutions ? There is no element among us that is more 
transcendent than the power which was developed in the 
economy of the old Mosaic commonwealth. 



XVII. 
IN THE LAND OF MOAB. 



" Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent 
two of his disciples." — Matt. xi. 2. 



The prison in which John the Baptist lay was in the 
castle of Machaerus on the east side of the Dead Sea. A 
castle built upon a high crag overlooked the land of Moab 
on the left hand ; the Dead Sea in front, and the great 
plain of Moab around about the Jordan, over against 
Jericho, and extending north as far as Lebanon. It was 
this crag, or a neighboring one, from which Moses had 
taken his survey of the promised land. It was from this 
point that Balaam, called to curse Israel in behalf of Balak, 
had been seized with a spirit of prophecy, and blessed those 
for whom his monarch sought cursing. Perhaps there is 
not — certainly there is not east of the Jordan — any place 
that has more Biblical associations connected with it than 
this land of Moab ; and my remarks to-night will hover 
around about the scenes that transpired there. 

We have been for several Sabbath evenings occupying 
ourselves with the interior economy of the Israelites — their 
constitution, their laws, their great national observances — 
for the sake of coming into some knowledge of the spirit 
and genius of this remarkable people and sympathy there- 
with. Historically tracing their career, we left them on the 
plains in front of Mount Sinai. After devious wanderings, 
thirty-eight years having expired, and all that were twenty- 
one years of age when they left Egypt having been num- 



Sunday evening, March 16, 1879. Lesson : John xi. 2-15. 



3i6 . BIBLE STCDIES. 

bered with the dead, at last they had come to the point at 
which we resume our narrative — to the southern border of 
Palestine, but eastward, on account of the warlike people 
that dwelt just below Palestine. They took a detour, not 
following the table-land close by the Dead Sea, but going 
far east of it, avoiding Moab. 

Here the strength of blood is a notable fact. The 
Israelites were descendants of Abraham, whose relation- 
ship and intimacy with Lot you w411 remember ; and the 
people of Ammon and Moab were the. direct descendants 
of Lot after the destruction of the cities of the plain. 
Hundreds of years had passed away, and generation after 
generation had slept ; and yet, when Moses came to bring 
the descendants of Abraham into the promised land, he 
held the territory of Moab and the territory of Ammon 
sacred, on account of the relationship of Abraham and 
Lot, and asked permission to pass through these terri- 
tories. And when the people were afraid of his great 
multitude, he turned aside from their boundaries ; and, 
flushed with recent victories, he passed by them without 
harming their fields, without plucking clusters from their 
vineyards, and without even drinking out of their wells 
that lay all throughout the king's highway. 

The Israelites, at the time of this narrative, had camped 
down near the Jordan, on what were called " the plains of 
Moab." The Moabites had occupied the territory clear up 
on the east of the Dead Sea, but had been driven back by 
their enemies, and now they only held the land up to the 
river Arnon, about halfway between the northern and 
southern ends of that sea ; the Israelites camping north 
and east of them. Thus, partly surrounding the Moab- 
ites, the Hebrews were in a position such that they might 
cut them off on the north ; and the king, Balak, felt 
considerable uneasiness, — and had reason to be uneasy, 
for he did ik t know at what moment this great victo- 
rious people would roll like an avalanche over him and 
dispossess him of what was left to him of the Moabitish 
country. As the land was very rich for agricultural pur- 



IN THE LAXD OF MOAB. 317 

poses, and as he, therefore, was all the more reluctant to 
give it up, he determined to take spiritual as well as carnal 
weapons and destroy this on-coming host. So he sent far 
across the desert and summoned the most eminent prophet 
of his nation and of his time, Balaam by name ; and there 
is not, in the whole compass of Old Testament Scripture, 
anything more sublime than the utterances which issued 
from the mouth of this prophet — a man reared, undoubt- 
edly, under heathen auspices, but standing as evidence that 
while heathenism was imperfect in its conceptions of God, 
abhorrent in mingling worship with lusts and appetites, 
miserably corrupt in morals and in the higher forms of 
ethics, there nevertheless existed in its men and in its wor- 
ship certain great truths both of God and of moral gov- 
ernment ; and nowhere more than in the Old Testament is 
there a tribute paid to the natural religion which pre- 
vailed in nations outside of the Israelites. We have been 
brought up to suppose that there was no true knowledge 
of God except in Israel ; but history does not conform to 
any such notion as that. There was a great deal of knowl- 
edge of God in other nations, although it was adulterated 
and mixed with much that went far to destroy its moral 
effect. In the original the greater part of this history is in 
the form of poetry. In our authorized version the poetry 
does not appear. The poetry of the old Hebrews was not, 
like ours, in rhyme. It was peculiar to their literature, but 
it was arithmetical and rhythmic to a degree. 

" The children of Israel set forward, and pitched in the plains of Moab 
on this side Jordan by Jericho [that is, over against Jericho].* And Balak 
the son of Zippor saw all that Israel had done to the Amorites. And Moab 
was sore afraid of the people, because they were many : and Moab was dis- 
tressed because of the children of Israel." 

How great that distress was will be more apparent if you 
turn to a remarkable passage in Micah, where is recorded a 
conversation between Balaam and King Balak which is 
recorded nowhere else, and which is generally regarded by 

*The Revised Version (1885) has it, "pitched . . . beyond the Jor- 
dan at Jericho." — Numbers, xxii. i. — Editor, 



3i8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

wise and learned students of the Bible as being a historical 
record of a conversation that positively took place : — 

" I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of 
the house of servants ; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam. 

my people, remember now what Balak king of Moab consulted, and what 
Balaam the son of Beor answered him from Shittim unto Gilgal ; that ye 
may know the righteousness of the Lord." 

Then follows the conversation. Says the king : — 

"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself before the 
high God ? shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves of a 
year old ? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten 
thousands of rivers of oil ? shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, 
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul ? " 

This is not poetry. In times of desperate emergency 
and need, when the danger was utter, human sacrifices 
were made, and the heir apparent was the favorite sacri- 
fice. King Balak was driven to that extremity in the pres- 
ence of this armed host, and he asked Balaam what sacrifices 
he should make — whether they should be sacrifices of his 
flocks and herds, or whether he should give his son — the 
fruit of his body for the sin of his soul. 

And the reply is ever memorable : — 

" He hath showed thee, O man, what is good ; and what doth the Lord 
require of thee, but to do justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly 
with thy God ? " 

But, to return to the narrative. 

"And Moab said unto the elders of Midian, Now shall this company lick 
up all that are round about us, as the ox licketh up the grass of the field. 
And Balak the son of Zippor was king of the Moabites at that time. He 
sent messengers therefore unto Balaam the son of Beor to Pethor, which 
is by the river of the land of the children of his people, to call him, saying, 
Behold there is a people come out from Egypt : behold, they cover the face 
of the earth, and they abide over against me : come now therefore, I pray 
thee, curse me this people ; for they are too mighty for me : ])eradventure 

1 shall prevail, that we may smite them, and that I may drive them out 
of the land : for I wot that he whom thou blessest is blessed, and he whom 
thou cursest is cursed." 

This not only indicates a prophet of very great reputa- 
tion, but also the superstitious idea that a remarkable 
man, called on the eve of some campaign, had a power 



I.V THE LAND OF MOAB. 319 

which was equivalent to sorcery — the power, as it were, of 
breathing mildew, so that his curse would make a differ- 
ence with the fate of the adversary. 

"And the elders of Moab and the elders of Midian departed with the 
rewards of divination in their hand ; and they came unto Balaam, and spake 
unto him the words of Balak." 

Now you will bear in mind that in this narrative (and I 
shall return to it), as in all that very early day, dreams were 
supposed to be divine revelations. They are yet, by the 
superstitious and the ignorant ; but then they were thought 
to be the voice and teaching of God in such a sense that 
where things had been seen by men in a vision they were 
to be regarded as prophecies or histories. The events that 
took place in dreams at night were looked upon in the 
morning as veritable facts. Such being the case, those 
events were recorded, and they passed down into history. 
There is many and many a time when in the Old Testa- 
ment record God is represented as telling a man to do 
abominable things — as, in a dream of the night, coming to 
him and addressing to him such and such commands. 
Sleeping and waking revelations were regarded as alike 
historical and actual ; and many of them have come down 
to us in these old records as if the events described hap- 
pened in the sight of all men. 

Balaam returns no answer to these emissaries of Balak, 
but says : — 

" Lodge here this night, and I will bring you word again, as the Lord 
shall speak unto me : and the princes of Moab abode with Balaam. And 
God came unto Balaam, and said, What men are these with thee ? And 
Balaam said unto God, Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab, hath sent 
unto me, saying, Behold, there is a people come out of Egypt, which covereth 
the face of the earth : come now, curse me them ; peradventure I shall be 
able to overcome them, and drive them out. And God said unto Balaam, 
Thou shalt not go with them; thou shalt not curse the people: for they 
are blessed." 

I do not undertake to say that there was no divine influ- 
ence exerted on the mind of the prophet : I only express 
my conviction that these were visions of the night. Never- 
theless, as I have often told you, the instances of men 



320 BIBLE STUDIES. 

gifted with the prophetic temperament, both in the Bible 
and out of it, are too frequent for us to doubt the existence 
of natures which are at times exceedingly sensitive to outer 
influences — certainly physical, and t believe also spiritual. 

"And Balaam rose up in the morning, and said unto the princes of Ealak, 
Get you into your land: for the Lord refuseth to give me leave to go with 
you. And the princes of Moab rose up, and they went unto Balak, and 
said, Balaam refuseth to come with us. And Balak sent yet again princes, 
more, and more honorable than they." 

He thought the prophet had an eye to a good bargain, 
and that he had not sent enough presents, and dignitaries, 
and promises of exaltation. So he sent a much better 
salary. 

"And they came to Balaam, and said to him, Thus saith Balak the son of 
Zippor, Let nothing, I pray thee, hinder thee from coming unto me : for I 
will promote thee unto very great honor, and I will do whatsoever thou 
sayest unto me : come therefore, I pray thee, curse me this people. And 
Balaam answered and said unto the servants of Balak, If Balak v/ould give 
me his house full of silver and gold, I cannot go beyond the word of the 
Lord my God, to do less or more. Now therefore, I pray you, tarry ye also 
here this night, that I may know wdiat the Lord will say unto me more. 

"And God came unto Balaam at night, and said unto him, If the men 
come to call thee, rise up, and go with them ; but yet the word which I shall 
say unto thee, that shalt thou do. 

"And Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his ass, and went with 
the princes of Moab." 

Now comes a paragraph which I am going to read just 
as it stands, and on which I shall then make a few remarks. 

"And God's anger was kindled because he went : and the angel of the 
Lord stood in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding 
upon his ass, and his two servants were with him. And the ass saw the 
angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand : 
and the ass turned aside out of the way, and went into the field : and 
Balaam smote the ass, to turn her into the way. But the angel of the Lord 
stood in a path of the vineyards, a wall being on this side, and a wall on 
that side. And when the ass saw the angel of the Lord, she thrust herself 
unto the wall, and crushed Balaam's foot against the wall : and he smote 
her again. And the angel of the Lord went furtlier, and stood in a narrow 
place, where was no way to turn either to the right hand or to the left. 
And when the ass saw the angel of the Lord, she fell down under Balaam : 
and Balaam's anger was kindled [when ahorse stumbles men always thrash 
him], and he smote the ass with a staff. And the Lord opened the mouth 



IN THE LAXD OF MOAB. 321 

of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, What have I done unto thee, that thou 
hast smitten me these three times ? And Balaam said unto the ass, Because 
thou hast mocked me : I would there were a sword in mine hand, for now 
would I kill thee. And the ass said unto Balaam, Am not I thine ass, upon 
which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this day? was I ever 
wont to do so unto thee ? " 

This is a very interesting conversation. 

"And he said. Nay. Then the Lord opened the eyes of Balaam, and he 
saw the angel of the Lord standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his 
hand : and he bowed down his head, and fell flat on his face. And the 
angel of the Lord said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass 
these three times ? Behold, I went out to withstand thee, because thy way 
is perverse before me : and the ass saw me, and turned from me these three 
times : unless she had turned from me, surely now also I had slain thee, 
and saved her alive. And Balaam said unto the angel of the Lord, I have 
sinned ; for I knew not that thou stoodest in the way against me : now 
therefore, if it displease thee, I will get me back again. And the angel of 
the Lord said unto Balaam, Go with the men : but only the word that I 
shall speak unto thee, that thou shalt speak. So Balaam went with the 
princes of Balak." 

This is just exactly what we might expect of an imag- 
ative and yet superstitious-minded man like Balaam. It is 
about what one might suppose would arise in the visions 
of the night and seem to him to be notable fact. Even 
in times of superstition it must have startled a man to hear, 
of all things on earth, an ass talking, and talking good 
sense, and getting the better of an argument between him- 
self and his master. But you are all aware that in dreams 
there is no such thing as incongruity. In dreams the most 
astonishing combinations occur without the slightest sur- 
prise. One would not be at all surprised, in dreaming at 
night, if he should hear a grasshopper sing like a canary 
bird. Nothing that happens in dreams is considered 
strange or mysterious. Fear and shame frequently come 
in dreams, but almost never a sense of right or wrong. So 
we can understand how Balaam, having this dream in the 
night, thought it to be real, and recited it in the morning 
as veritable truth. 

One way in which commentators have sought to avoid 
difficulty has been by accepting this as historical ; it is 



322 BIBLE STUDIES. 

held up as a piece of histoiy. We know that the history 
of the Moabites is being somewhat exhumed. You will 
recollect that some years ago we had intelligence that what 
was called '' the Moabitish stone ." had been discovered, 
that there were elaborate inscriptions upon it, and that on 
being deciphered it tallied exactly with many points of his- 
tory as related in the Old Testament. But it is thought by 
many who have made a study of the history of Moab that 
this whole passage was transferred from the Moabitish 
records into the writings of the Old Testament. 

Another evidence of what I have said to the effect that 
the Old Testament is not a history written continuously 
by the same men, but is a compilation, is the fact that even 
in the writings of Moses there are fables introduced ; that 
impressions in the public mind were caught up by him and 
answered in his writings ; that many accounts of things 
which were said to have transpired even after his time found 
their way into the text of his books. 

This account, therefore, is not at all strange if it be 
simply the superstitious account of the Moabites in the 
form of the experience of their great prophet. 

" When Balak heard that Balaam was come, he went out to meet him unto 
a city of Moab, which is in the border of Arnon, which is in the utmost 
coast. And Balak said unto Balaam, Did I not earnestl)^ send unto thee to 
call thee.? wherefore camest thou not unto me? am I not able indeed to 
promote thee to honor t And Balaam said unto Balak, Lo, I am come unto 
thee : have I now any power at all to say anything ? the word that God 
putteth in my mouth, that shall I speak." 

We are not to suppose that these persons were deceivers, 
impostors. There is such a thing even in our time and in 
our colder clime as men rising quite out of their normal or 
ordinary condition into a species of excitement, a state of 
exaltation ; you might say that the personality of such 
individuals is different in their lower or usual condition 
from what it is in their higher or abnormal condition ; and 
these old heathen prophets of the highly-strung, nervous 
Asiatic races undoubtedly rose into an exalted state such 
that their language and their conduct at such times were 
very different from ordinary. 



IN THE LAND OF MOAB. 323 

"And Balaam went with Balak, and they came unto Kiijath-huzoth. And 
Balak offered oxen and sheep, and sent to Balaam, and to the princes that 
were with him. And it came to pass on the morrow, that Balak took 
Balaam, and brought him up into the high places of Baal, that thence he 
might see the utmost part of the people." 

That is, he ascended the highest crag. I can see him, in 
imagination, standing there, weird, venerable, perplexed, 
and looking up at the heaven, to the left far into the 
wilderness on the south, into the land of Judea on the 
west across the Dead Sea, and northward on the right hand 
over the whole encamped host of Israel, and seeing the 
towers of the cities of Palestine gleaming in the morning 
sun, and the rolling land clear on to the white-topped 
Mount Lebanon. Not a great while after, his great peer 
and rival, Moses, also stood, probably, not far from the same 
spot ; and very near the spot on which, later, was the 
tower of Machaerus, in which John lay a prisoner, and out 
of which he looked, no longer with physical eyes upon the 
geographical features of the country, but with spiritual 
vision over all the land, and, knowing that the kingdom 
of God was coming, sent his disciples to ask Jesus, " Art 
thou he that should come, or do we look for another ?" 

Here were these great men — John, whom Christ pro- 
nounced the most eminent of worthies ; Moses, the most 
remarkable lawgiver of all the world ; and Balaam, the 
oldest representative of twilight prophets that belonged to 
the heathen nations. They were strangely gathered on 
this one mountain, Nebo, or Pisgah, which has been con- 
secrated in sacred song. 

"And the Lord put a word in Balaam's mouth, and said. Return unto 
Balak, and thus thou shalt speak. 

"And he returned unto him, and, lo, he stood by his burnt sacrifice, he, and 
all the princes of Moab. And he took up his parable, and said:* 
" Balak the King of Moab hath brought me 
From Aram, out of the mountains of the east, saying: 
Come, curse me Jacob, 



* Balaam's " Parables " are here divided into poetic lines, according to 
the Revised Version ; the phraseology, however, remains that of the King 
James version, used by Mr. Beecher. — Editor. 



■324 BIBLE STUDIES. 

And come, defy Israel. 

How shall I curse, whom God hath not cursed ? 

Or how shall I defy, whom the Lord hath not defied ? 

For from the top of the rocks I se,e him, 

And from the hills I behold him: 

Lo, the people shall dwell alone, « 

And shall not be reckoned among the nations. 

Who can count the dust of Jacob, 

And the number of the fourth part of Israel ? 

Let me die the death of the righteous, 

And let my last end be like his ! 
"And Balak said unto Balaam, What hast thou done unto me t I took thee 
to curse mine enemies, and, behold, thou hast blessed them altogether. And 
he answered and said. Must I not take heed to speak that which the Lord 
hath put in my mouth ? And Balak said unto him, Come, I pray thee, with 
me unto another place, from whence thou mayest see them : thou shalt see 
but the utmost part of them, and shalt not see them all : and curse me them 
from thence. And he brought him into the field of Zophim, to the top of 
Pisgah, and built seven altars, and offered a bullock and a ram on every altar. 
"And he said unto Balak, Stand here by thy burnt offering, while I 
meet the Lord yonder. And the Lord met Balaam, and put a word in his 
mouth, and said, Go again unto Balak, and say thus. 

"And when he came to him, behold, he stood by his burnt offering, and 
the princes of Moab with him. And Balak said unto him, What hath the 
Lord spoken ? And he took up his parable, and said, 
" Rise up, Balak, and heart; 

Hearken unto me, thou son of Zippor : 

God is not a man, that he should lie ; 

Neither the son of man, that he should repent : 

Hath he said, and shall he not do it } 

Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? 

Behold, I have received commandment to bless : 

And he hath blessed, and I cannot reverse it. 

He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, 

Neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel : 

The Lord his God is with him. 

And the shout of a king is among them. 

God brought them out of Egypt ; 

He hath as it were the strength of an unicorn.* 

Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, 

Neither is there any divination against Israel : 

According to this time it shall be said of Jacob and of Israel, 

What hath God wrought ! 

Behold, the people shall rise up as a great lion, 



* Wild-ox. 



. IN THE LAND OF MOAB. 325 

And lift up himself as a young lion : 
He shall not lie down until he eat of the prey, 
And drink the blood of the slain. 
"And Balak said unto Balaam, Neither curse them at all, nor bless them 
at all." 

It was as much as to say, in a kingly way, "Hold your 
tongue ! " 

" But Balaam answered and said unto Balak, Told not I thee, saying. All 
that the Lord speaketh, that I must do ? And Balak said unto Balaam, 
Come, I pray thee, I will bring thee unto another place." 

It used to be thought that certain places were favorable 
— that some were enchanted — that some were under mag- 
ical spells ; and having tried twice, Balak thought that 
perhaps elsewhere the desired curse might be granted. 

" Peradventure it will please God that thou mayest curse me them from 
thence." 

But after sacrificing again Balaam felt that it was not 
the will of God to curse Israel. 

"And when Balaam saw that it pleased the Lord to bless Israel, he went 
not, as at other times, to seek for enchantments, but he set his face toward 
the \vilderness. -And Balaam lifted up his eyes, and he saw Israel abiding 
in his tents according to their-tribes ; and the spirit of God came upon him. 
And he took up his parable, and said, 

" Balaam, the son of Beor hath said, 

And the man whose eyes are open hath said : 

He hath said, which heard the words of God, 

Which saw the vision of the Almighty, 

Falling into a trance, but having his eyes open: 

How goodly are thy tents, O Jacob, 

And thy tabernacles, O Israel ! 

As the valleys are they spread forth, 

As gardens by the river's side, 

As the trees of lign-aloes which the Lord hath planted, 

And as cedar trees beside the waters. 

He shall pour the water out of his buckets, 

And his seed shall be in many waters. 

And his king shall be higher than Agag, 

And his kingdom shall be exalted. 

God brought him forth out of Egypt ; 

He hath as it were the strength of an unicorn : 

He shall eat up the nations his enemies, 

And shall break their bones, 

And pierce them through with his arrows. 



326 BIBLE STUDIES. 

He couched, he lay down as a lion, 
And as a great lion : who shall stir him up ? 
Blessed is he that blesseth thee. 
And cursed is he that curseth thee. 
"And Balak's anger was kindled against Balaam, and he smote his hands 
together." 

He was very angry. He had sought out Balaam ; he 
had intreated him, he had commanded him to come ; in 
vain. At last, in answer to yet greater presents and hon- 
ors, the prophet came ; and he had sought enchantments 
and sacrifices for the formulation of the curse ; but when 
he spoke, he spoke blessings. With change of place and 
change of enchantments, he again blessed the Israelites. 
And now, when — lifted above enchantments, and under the 
influence of the spirit of God — Balaam blessed them again, 
Balak was hot with anger, and slapped his hands together, 
as a man about to fight. 

"And Balak said unto Balaam, I called thee to curse mine enemies, and, 
behold, thou hast altogether blessed them these three times. Therefore 
now flee thou to thy place : I thought to promote thee unto great honor ; 
but, lo, the Lord hath kept thee back from honor." 

Balaam was not scared a bit. 

" And Balaam said unto Balak, Spake I not also to thy messengers which 
thou sentest unto me, saying, If Balak would give me his house full of silver 
and gold, I cannot go beyond the commandment of the Lord, to do either 
good or bad of mine own mind ; but what the Lord saith, that will I speak ? 
And now, behold, I go unto my people : come therefore, and I will advertise 
thee what this people shall do to thy people in the latter days. And he 
took up his parable, and said, 

" Balaam the son of Beor hath said, 
And the man whose eyes are open hath said : 
He hath said, which heard the words of God, .-. 
And knew the knowledge of the Most High, 
Which saw the vision of the Almighty, 
Falling into a trance, but haying his eyes open." 

He was himself conscious of passing into a trance state. 

" I shall see him, but not now : 
I shall behold him, but not nigh : 
There shall come a Star out of Jacob, 
And a Scepter shall rise out of Israel, 
And shall smite the corners of Moab, 



IiV THE LAND OF MOAB. 327 

- And destroy all the children of Sheth. 
And Edom shall be a possession, 
Seir also shall be a possession for his enemies ; 
And Israel shall do valiantly. 

Out of Jacob shall come he that shall have dominion, 
And shall destroy him that remaineth of the city. 
"And when he looked on Amalek, he took up his parable, and said, 
" Amalek was the first of the nations; 
But his latter end shall be that he perish for ever. 
"And he looked on the Kenites, and took up his parable, and said, 
" Strong is thy dwelling place. 
And thou puttest thy nest in a rock. 
Nevertheless the Kenite shall be wasted, 
Until Asshur shall carry thee away captive. 
"And he took up his parable, and said, 

" Alas, who shall live when God doeth this ! 
And ships shall come from the coast of Chittim, 
And shall afflict Asshur, and shall afflict Eber, 
And he also shall perish for ever. 
"And Balaam rose up, and went and returned to his place : and Balak 
also went his way." . 

Now, this sublime strain of poetry, or prophecy, or what- 
ever you may call it, throws a great light upon the actual 
condition of things outside of Israel — upon the character of 
some of the men that served as priests and prophets in the 
midst of heathen worship. They were evidently not alto- 
gether given over to superstition and priestcraft and self- 
seeking. 

Yet, when Balaam returned to his own people he did not 
do it without degenerating and falling back into his or- 
dinary nature again. He counseled, it would seem, that 
though Balak could not by the hand of violence prevail 
against the adversary he might by craft and cunning. It 
was in accordance with his counsel that the minions of Moab 
went forth to inveigle and seduce the Israelites, giving rise 
*^^o some of the most terrible penalties that Moses ever in- 
flicted. Afterwards, in the war between the Israelites and 
the Ammonites, Balaam was slain. 

I suppose more sermons have been preached on the sub- 
ject of Balaam than on almost any other ; and yet there is 
a great deal of mystery connected with this story. It is so 



328 BIBLE STUDIES. 

different from the ordinary lines of modern experience 
that we have no measures or rules by which we can adju- 
dicate it. It stands to me as a cloudy, sublime drama. 

Not long after this the word of the Lord came to Moses 
to lay aside his burdens. You will remember that accord- 
ing to the statements of the old records Moses was eighty 
years of age when he went out to deliver his brethren. 
He had never been with them until he was about forty 
years of age, and then he had to exile himself in Midian. 
He is spoken of as the meekest man, though not in the 
sense in which we understand the word vieek. Indeed, we 
have no equivalent of the original word that is translated 
meek. It signifies that quality which ennobles a strong 
and wise man in the continual modesty of his own merit 
and excellence. You will bear in mind how disinterested 
he was. You will recollect that though he was the reputed 
son of the Egyptian king, though he was a member of the 
royal famil}^ yet, when he saw his own people oppressed, 
he undertook their vindication, he lost his standing at 
court, and was driven out. How faithfully he served for 
many years his father-in-law Jethro, we know. And when 
he was called of God to serve Him, he was so determined 
in his humble opinion of himself that he pled and pled 
and pled to be excused, until the anger of the Lord was 
aroused against him. And when he at last yielded to 
the divine wish, he besought God to let Aaron be the real 
leader, and he the counselor. Yet at every step he was 
the man that gathered together out of Egypt and out of 
contemporaneous nations the best parts, and fitted and 
molded them for his own people. He was the center of 
authority. And although in military matters Joshua was 
the general, Moses was, after all, the legislator and judge 
and real leader, going on in the march through the wilder- 
ness bearing its multiplied cares and labors until at last he 
came to the border of the promised land. 

And now the word of the Lord came to him, '' Thou 
shalt not go over." He had been telling his people for 
forty years that they were to pass to a land of milk and 



IN THE LAND OF MOAB. 329 

honey which had been promised to their fathers. It was 
the thought of his life, it was the desire and the mission of 
his soul, having piloted the people so long and so far, to be 
permitted to introduce them into the promised land ; and 
finally, when he stood over against that land, the Lord 
said unto him, " Thou shalt not go over." He is the pro- 
totype, the representative, of those noble men in every age 
who have wrought all their life long to pave the way for 
the success of those that came after them — of the men that 
laid right foundations ; as Luther, who died without see- 
ing the results of his labor ; of men who perished on the 
scaffold to give liberty of thought to their fellow men, 
dying without beholding the change ; of missionaries who 
planted the seeds of civilization and religion, but reaped 
none of the fruits of those seeds ; of inventors who made 
valuable discoveries, and died poor that others might take 
what they had accomplished and carry it out to success. 
The victory of one man is founded on the defeat of a pred- 
ecessor, time and time again, in this life. 

Now Moses had, if ever any man had, a right to walk 
with unabated strength and undimmed eye across the bor- 
der and into the promised land. But God said to him, 
"Get thou up upon the top of Nebo." It was probably 
the same mountain top from which Balaam had overlooked 
it. There God showed his faithful servant a vision of 
the promised land, not in a dream, but by a visible repre- 
sentation to the eye that understands what it sees ; and 
there, — without companion or spectator, alone, — died 
Moses. He left the greatest name of antiquity — for per- 
sonal purity, for grandeur of conception, for wisdom of 
judgment, and for good conduct of the affairs of state on 
the largest scale during the longest period — the man that 
laid the foundations on which modern commonwealths 
have been built. He stood alone ; and who dying, does 
not stand alone ? That is the one act in which there can 
be no companionsliip. Though a million are around about 
us, the moment comes, in passing away, when we are as 
solitary as if we dwelt in the great desert of Sahara, or in 



330 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the very midst of the ocean itself ; and if Moses had given 
up his breath to God surrounded by myriads of his people 
he would have been as much alone as when he stood upon 
the summit of Mount Nebo on the fo*p of Pisgah, to deliver 
up his soul. He was buried in one of those ravines : but 
no man knows where. 

As Moses drew near to the appointed bound of his life 
he gave three songs to literature, but one of which I shall 
recite in your hearing. He gave the song in which is 
recounted the history of God's dealings with the people of 
Israel, which is contained in the thirty-second chapter of 
Deuteronomy and which occupies a wide space. He gave, 
also, the prophetic song describing blessings and curses 
upon the tribes, after the manner of Abraham and of Jacob. 
He likewise gave forth the grand funeral song of the ages. 
Imagine the astonishment he must have felt when the tid- 
ings came that he must needs depart, and when, seized 
with a poetic fervor, he indited this Psalm : — 
" Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place 
In all generations. 

Before the mountains were brought forth, 
Or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, 
Even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. 
Thou turnest man to destruction ; 
And sayest, Return, ye children of men." 

He had seen a whole generation of his people perish in 
the wilderness. 

" For a thousand years in thy sight 

Are but as yesterday when it is past, 

And as a watch in the night. 

Thou carriest them away as with a flood ; they are as a sleep : 

In the morning they are like grass which groweth up. 

In the morning it flourisheth, and groweth up; 

In the evening it is cut down, and withereth." 
When children look forward, how. long the years are ! 
When they become old men and look back across the great 
line of years, how short those years are ! How slow time 
pulsates, to the young ! How like an arrow it flies, to the 
old ! And where has there ever been a more sublime 
expression of it than this ? 



iiV THE LAND OF MO A B. 33 1 

" For we are consumed by thine anger, 
And by thy wrath are we troubled. 
Thou hast set our iniquities before thee, 
Our secret sins in the light of thy countenance. 
For all our days are passed away in thy wrath : 
We spend our years as a tale that is told. 
The days of our years are threescore years and ten ; 
And if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, 
Yet is their strength labor and sorrow ; 
For it is soon cut off, and we fly away. 
Who knoweth the power of thine anger ? 
Even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath. 
So teach us to number our days. 
That we may apply our hearts unto wisdom. 
Return, O Lord, how long .? 
And let it repent thee concerning thy servants. 
O satisfy us early with thy mercy ; 
That we may rejoice and be glad all our days." 

There is in the close of the history of this great person- 
age, Moses, a singular parallel to the doctrine which he 
taught all his life long. Nowhere would he allow any 
visible image or symbol of the eternal God to be carved or 
erected. The God of his people must be the Invisible One 
who made the heaven and the earth. He had himself been 
their leader ; and when the time came for him to depart, 
he would withdraw himself absolutely from the sight of 
men. They should not have even his bones or his sepul- 
cher to materialize or to worship. So when he died he 
was hidden, and the people never knew where his grave 
was. Full of years and full of honor, his natural force 
was not diminished, nor was his eye dimmed ; and he went 
out of sight. As the old prophet Elijah disappeared, so 
his great precursor, Moses, disappeared from among the 
people, and gave them no chance to build over him a statue 
or monument around which they could gather for super- 
stitious worship ; and he became an invisible power. 
Having taught the invisible God, he was caught up into 
His presence, and became himself to his people like his 
God, an invisible authority w^hich should lift their minds 
upward and not downward. 



XVIII. 

CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. 



It is somewhat perilous for men to examine certain parts 
of the Old Testament. They who do it have to carry 
burdens. If we do it not, however, we need not think that 
it will not be done. There are more and more men read- 
ing the Old Testament in critical mood and expressing 
themselves unfavorably in respect to it, and the public 
mind is being filled with conflicting ideas regarding its 
contents. Therefore, it is a part of the duty of every man 
who ministers to an intelligent and reflecting congrega- 
tion to grapple with facts. This I have been attempting ; 
and I confess, to-night, that in the cursory rather than 
critical examination of the books of the Old Testament 
which I have been making with you through the past few 
months, I have encountered difliculties the most serious. 

I may say, honestly, that I am not myself content with 
the result of my own examinations of the subjects to which 
I have called your attention. After every consideration 
that I can bring to bear upon them, there are parts of this 
history that leave on my mind a very sad and mournful 
impression. Honesty requires me to say so much. I 
would not willingly deceive you. Not for the world would 
I say I believe a thing when I do not believe' it ; nor would 
I urge you to believe what I do not myself believe. I try 
to be honest with you ; and perhaps on that account you 
will be the more ready to listen to me, when I say that my 
difficulties lie further back, in the main, than those which 
are ordinarily alleged, and that the usual difficulties are to 
a certain extent susceptible of explanation which, if it 



Sunday evening, March 23, 1879. LI'-SSON : Psa. cxxxv. 



CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. ^2>3 

does not cure, certainly alleviates. Alleviation is the most 
I can promise to-night. 

We will consider this evening a portion of the military 
campaigns of Joshua. We closed, last Sunday night, the 
account of the leadership of that great and noble man, 
Moses. After he had received the warning of God that his 
time was come, he called, appointed, and consecrated or 
ordained Joshua (in Hebrew, Ychoshua, Jehovah helps) to 
take his place. Moses had instituted a great policy, but 
the carrying out of that policy required military adminis- 
tration. Joshua appears to have been by nature, and also 
by experience, a notable general, and his name must rank 
among the great military geniuses of history. 

It was under his command, all the way through the 
wilderness, that the Israelitish armies Vv^ere able to beat off 
the assaults made upon them by the Midianites, and by the 
other adversaries east of the Jordan, and to take possession 
of the whole country of Canaan afterwards. 

Before entering into some account of the campaigns of 
Joshua, let me ask your attention to wh^t may be called the 
military commission of Moses recorded in the twentieth 
chapter of Deuteronomy. You will perceive here perhaps 
the most extraordinary mixture of humanity and severity 
that is found in literature : — 

"When thou goest out to battle against thine enemies, and seest horses 
and chariots, and a people more than thou, be not afraid of them : for 
Jehovah thy God is with thee, which brought thee up out of the land of 
Egypt. And it shall be, when ye are come nigh unto the battle, that the 
priests shall approach and speak unto the people [now look at the tender- 
ness and the humanity that are here exhibited], and shall say unto them, 
Hear, O Israel, ye approach this day unto battle against your enemies : 
let not your hearts faint, fear not, and do not tremble, neither be ye terrified 
because of them ; for Jehovah your God is he that goeth with you, to fight 
for you against your enemies, to save you. And the officers shall speak 
unto the people, saying, What man is there that hath built a new house, and 
hath not dedicated it? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in 
the battle, and another man dedicate it." 

That is as beautiful a piece of poetic humanity as is any- 
where recorded. It is as if it were said, Where a young 
man has just laid the foundation of his house, do not de- 



334 BIBLE STUDIES. 

stroy him ; let him go out of the battle, and return to his 
home ; there are enough to take his place. 

"And what man is he that hath planted a vineyard, and hath not yet eaten 
of it? Let him also go and return unto his house, lest he die in the battle, 
and another man eat of it." 

That, too, betokens tender-hearted kindness in brooding 
over and caring for young life. 

"And what man is there that hath betrothed a wife, and hath not taken her ? 
let him go and return unto his house, lest he die in the battle, and another 
man take her." 

He that hath dwelt with, the woman of his love through 
a score of years has a thousand memories and associations 
that are more precious than those of a young man ; never- 
theless, the universal feeling of the race is that when love 
first blossoms, and the young are about to establish a 
household, that is one of the most exquisite phases of expe- 
rience in human life ; and the lawgiver put his command 
over it and protected it, by saying, Do not let such a man 
go to battle and be slain. 

"And the officers shall speak further unto the people, and they shall say, 
What man is there that is fearful and fJiint-hearted ? let him go and return 
unto his house, lest his brethren's heart faint as well as his heart." 

There was not only wisdom in guarding against the 
contagion of panic fear, but humanity toward the man who 
was without physical courage. There are a great many 
men who have no backbone ; and they are men, too. They 
did not make themselves. They did not pick out the 
qualities that were to be put into the machinery of their 
minds. And if a man was by nature wanting in this re- 
spect, it shows the humanity of the old Mosaic code that 
it protected him. Such men are not protected in modern 
times very much. 

"And it shall be, when the officers have made an end of speaking unto 
the people, that they shall make captains of the armies to lead the people." 

And I must not fail to add one other command of this 
extraordinary charge, which occurs at the end of it. 

" When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to 
take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by foicmg an axe against 



CAMPAIGXS OF JOSHUA. 335 

them : for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down (for 
the tree of the held is man's life) to employ them in the siege : only the 
trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy 
and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that 
maketh war with thee, until it be subdued." 

When the Prussians surrounded Paris, their lines lay 
among grounds and gardens that had in them all sorts of 
flowers and plants and beautiful things that had been 
handed down from father to son in their magnificence, and 
these were all swept away by the besom of destruction ; 
but Moses commanded that when a city was besieged for 
the purpose of taking it, no trees that bore fruit that men 
lived upon should be destroyed. He required that there 
should be tenderness shown to trees, even. 

That quality of compassion reigns through the Mosaic 
economy. The internal history of the Israelites develops 
the most exquisite portrayals of gentleness, and sweetness, 
and patience, and disinterestedness, and humanity. There- 
fore, the contrast is the more striking when you find 
coupled with them gross barbarities. 

" When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it [that is to say, alien 
cities], then proclaim peace unto it. And it shall be, if it make thee answer 
of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is 
found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee. 
And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then 
thou shalt besiege it : and when Jehovah thy God hath delivered it into thine 
hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword : but 
the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, 
even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat 
the spoil of thine enemies, which Jehovah thy God hath given thee. Thus 
shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are 
not of the cities of these nations. But of the cities of these people, which 
Jehovah thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive 
nothing that breatheth : but thou shalt utterly destroy them ; namely, the 
Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, 
and the Jebusites ; as Jehovah thy God hath commanded thee." 

Absolute, murderous annihilation to all cities, without 
exception, situated westward of the Jordan, was the stern 
command of Moses ; and this was the commission of war 
which he gave to Joshua. But now hear the reason for it: — 



336 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which thev 
have done unto their gods ; so should ye sin against Jehovah your God." 

In pursuance of this command Joshua entered upon the 
work faithfully and very successfully. An account of the 
campaign against the Midianites is narrated in the thirty- 
first chapter of Numbers. 

"Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, Avenge the children of Israel of the 
Midianites : afterward shalt thou be gathered unto thy people." 

Every tribe gave a thousand men. The Midianites rep- 
resented the Bedouin Arabs. They were a shepherd people 
yet. They were addicted to war yet. Like other tribes 
of the desert they were armed with spears. Portions of 
them inhabited the Sinaitic peninsula, and they stretched 
eastward to the south and east of Canaan as far as Moab ; 
and you will remember that it was with the Midianites that 
Balak the Moabite conspired, first to attack, and then — 
warned from that by Balaam's blessing instead of cursing 
— to seduce, the Israelites. Dwelling quietly, at this par- 
ticular time, they were not prepared for an attack ; and 
with about thirteen thousand men Joshua dashed into their 
midst and slew the five kings of Midian ; and in this battle 
Balaam was also slain. 

"And the children of Israel took all the women of Midian captives, and 
their little ones, and took the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks, 
and all their goods. And they burnt all their cities wherein they dwelt, and 
all their goodly castles, with fire. And they took all the spoil, and all the 
prey, both of men and of beasts. 

"And they brought the captives, and the prey, and the spoil, unto Moses, 
and Eleazar the priest, and unto the congregation of the children of Israel, 
unto the camp at the plains of Moab, which are by Jordan near Jericho. 
And Moses, and Eleazar the priest, and all the princes of the congregation, 
went forth to meet them without the camp. And Moses was wroth with the 
officers of the host, with the captains over thousands, and captains over 
hundreds, which came from the battle. And Moses said unto them, Have 
ye saved all the women alive ? Behold, these caused the children of Israel, 
through the counsel of Balaam, to commit trespass against Jehovah in the 
matter of Peor, and there was a plague among the congregation of Jehovah. 
Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman 
that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, 
that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves. 
And do ye abide without the camp seven days : whosoever hath killed any 



CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. 337 

person, and whosoever hath touched any slain, purify both yourselves and 
your captives on the third day, and on the seventh day." 

After having touched a dead body they had to abide 
seven days outside to purify themselves ; but after having 
slaughtered all the men, all the boys, and all the women 
.with the exception of the children girls, they felt no com- 
punction whatever ! * 

Having cleared their way by conflicts with the tribes on 
the east of the Jordan, — the Amorites ; Sihon, king of 
Heshbon ; and Og, king of Bashan, — they crossed the Jordan 
and encamped at Gilgal. At that point, it is said, the 
manna ceased to fall, and they ate of the grain of the coun- 
try. 

There is here a gem interposed such as you find not infre- 
quently in the fragmentary records of the Old Testament, 
without any prelude to explain it. We have a remarkable 
episode in respect to Joshua. 

"And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his 
eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his 
sword drawn in his hand : and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, 
Art thou for us, or for our adversaries ? And he said. Nay; but as captain 
of the host of Jehovah am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the 
earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his 
servant .'' And the captain of Jehovah's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy 
shoe from off thy foot : for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And 
Joshua did so." 

That is the whole story. If you sa}^ " That is an actual 
historical fact," it is rather a remarkable fact that an angel 
of the Lord should come to Joshua, and tell him to take 
his shoes off, and leave him without saying anything more ; 
but if you give to it a higher meaning it is something sub- 



*This rough surgery for afoul and deadly disease, however, was enforced 
by Moses with equal severity upon the Israelites themselves. When the 
Israelites at Peor yielded to the seductions of the daughters of Moab and 
united in their licentious worship of their gods, Moses commanded : *' Take 
all the chiefs of the people and hang them up unto Jehovah before the sun, 
that the fierce anger of Jehovah may turn away from Israel." And more- 
over a punitive " plague " slew " twenty and four thousand " of the children 
of Israel. Numbers xxv. 1-9. — Editor, 



338 BIBLE STUDIES. 

lime. If Joshua slumbered, if his soul was working upon 
the great task that had been given him to accomplish, — the 
conquest of Palestine, — and if in his sleep there seemed 
to come to him the great captain of Jehovah's host, saying 
to him, "Thou art on a holy spot," and then disappearing, 
that would be sublime as a vision of the night. When he 
rose in the morning, without a doubt he said, " I have seen 
the messenger of Jehovah, and I know it is a sacred cause 
to which I am called." 

It was by visions that men of old thought they received 
messages from God ; and doubtless some of their visions 
were divine messages : but dreams are very uncertain mes- 
sengers, and while some of them might have carried the 
truth some of them might have carried errors. 

Next (and I have omitted a great deal that belongs to this 
history, because it is not pertinent, particularly, to the line 
of difficulties which I am treating to-night) comes the fall 
of Jericho, described in the sixth chapter of the Book of 
Joshua. The people were to make a procession around the 
city for seven days, on the last day compassing the cit)^ 
seven times ; then the priests were to blow the trumpets, 
and the people were to shout ; and then the walls of the 
city would fall. The command was obeyed, and the city 
was taken possession of, and all that were in it were utterly 
destroyed with the edge of the sword, — man and woman, 
young and old, ox, and sheep, and ass, — with the following 
exceptions : — 

"Joshua had said unto the two men that had spied out the country, Go 
into the harlot's house [the woman who had harbored two Israelitish scouts 
and helped them to escape, and to whom they had sworn to protect her 
when their armies should come], and bring out thence the woman, and all 
that she hath, as ye sware unto her. And the young men that were spies 
went in, and brought out Rahab, and her father, and her mother, and her 
brethren, and all that she had ; and they brought out all her kindred, and 
left them without the camp of Israel. And they burnt the city with fire, 
and all that was therein : only the silver, and the gold, and the vessels of 
brass and of iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the Lord." 

Such was the destruction of Jericho. 

In the eighth chapter of Joshua we have an account of 



CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. 339 

the siege and overthrow of x\i. It seems that in the de- 
struction of Jericho a man named Achan had purloined 
and hidden gold. It was not exactly defalcation ; it was 
the primitive form of that which we do in our time far 
more skillfully. It was converting to private use that 
which had been devoted to the general treasury. It was 
counted a great sin then — a sin sufficient to bring down 
upon the Israelites divine punishment ; because it was direct 
disobedience of orders issued in the divine name. In this 
case it was found out, and retribution followed. For 
Joshua sent up only about three thousand men against Ai ; 
and the inhabitants came out and drove them off, and slew 
a great many of them ; and Joshua cast himself down be- 
fore the Lord, and mourned, and said : — 

" O Lord, what shall I say, when Israel turneth their backs before their 
enemies ! " 

That was a striking manifestation of patriotic feeling, 
in which he identified himself with the cause of God and 
his people, and took the shame of their cowardice upon 
himself. 

"For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land shall hear of it, 
and shall environ us round, and cut off our name from the earth : and 
what wilt thou do unto thy great name ? " 

He had thrown himself down on the very ground in his 
mortification ; and it is rather remarkable, the way in 
which God is represented as having looked upon a man 
crawling on the earth as a worm. 

"And the Lord said unto Joshua, Get thee up ; wherefore liest thou thus 
upon thy face ? " 

A great many men seem to think that God likes them if 
they wallow ; but God does not like to see a man behave 
himself unseemly any more than we do. Men recount 
their sins, and bemoan their unworthiness, and tell what 
worms they are ; but God would say to those who carry 
their humility to a morbid extreme, " Get up ! wherefore 
do you lie thus upon 3'our faces?" 

Then followed the discovery that Achan had taken and 
hidden for himself portions of " the devoted thing" com- 



340 BIBLE STUDIES. 

manded to be cast into the treasury of Jeliovah from out 
of the spoil of Jericho ; and the stoning and burning of 
Achan and, according to the custom of the time, of all 
his family and possessions. Thus, the nation having been 
purged of its disobedience, Joshua was once more inspired 
with courage and a better wisdom for the battle. 

Regarding himself as in communication with the divine 
Spirit, and acting in accordance with a new plan, which he 
accepted as an order of God, Joshua laid an ambush for 
Ai. He sent some thirty thousand men secretly, at night, 
to lie over behind, on the north side of it. The next morn- 
ing, with five thousand under his command, he approached 
the city as aforetime, and, as before, the people of Ai rushed 
out into battle. Then Joshua, making a feint of defeat, 
took his men off nimbly ; and the men of Ai ran after 
them, when Joshua stretched toward the city the spear he 
had in his hand, and the ambush arose quickly out of their 
place, and ran into the city from behind, took possession 
of it, and set fire to it. And as the men of Ai, seeing the 
city in flames behind them, started homeward, the Israel- 
itish host closed in on them, and between their two bodies 
ground the enemy to powder. The king of Ai was taken 
alive and brought to Joshua, and was hanged. 

"And it came to pass, when Israel had made an end of slaying all the 
inhabitants of Ai in the field, in the wilderness wherein they chased them, 
and when they were all fallen on the edge of the sword, until they were 
consumed, that all the Israelites returned unto Ai, and smote it with the 
edge of the sword. And so it was, that all that fell that day, both of men 
and women, were twelve thousand, even all the men of Ai. For Joshua 
drew not his hand back, wherewith he stretched out the spear, until he had 
utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai. Only the cattle and the spoil of 
that city Israel took for a prey unto themselves, according unto the word 
of ihe Lord which he commanded Joshua. And Joshua burnt Ai, and 
made it an heap forever, even a desolation unto this day. And the king of 
Ai he hanged on a tree until eventide : and as soon as the sun was down, 
Joshua commanded that tney should take his carcass down from the tree, 
and cast it at the entering of the gate of the city, and raise thereon a great 
heap of stones, that remaineth unto this day." 

There is the account of the destruction of Ai. Follow- 
ing this came the erection of an altar of thanksgiving to 



CAMPAIGA'S OF JOSHUA. 341 

Jehovah in Mount Ebal, and the reading of the blessings 
and cursings of the Law to the people assembled before 
that hill and Mount Gerizim, in the heart of the country 
where Jacob digged his famous well, and where Shechem, 
Samaria, and other later names made a locality second in 
notability only to Jerusalem. The fame of Jericho and Ai 
had gone abroad in the land, and the kings or chiefs of all 
the country round about and beyond Jordan "gathered 
themselves together, to fight with Joshua and with Israel." 

Next comes a pretty piece of strategy. It seems that 
the captains of Gibeon — a city greater than Ai — had more 
policy than courage, or else they had more sagacity ; for, 
'being satisfied in their minds that the Israelites were going 
to overrun and take possession of the land, they summoned 
their chief men, they clad them in their old clothes, they 
put on their feet shoes that were clouted and worn, they 
provided mouldy bread for their haversacks, and, unshaved 
and in every way disfigured, they went as a deputation to 
Joshua, and said, "We, of a far-off nation, have heard that 
God is with this people, and that they are going to be 
triumphant, and we desire to make peace and enter into a 
covenant with them." 

Joshua, well pleased with their message, and seeing on 
looking into their pouches what sort of bread they were 
munching, and being satisfied, on beholding their worn-out 
shoes and clothes, that they had come a great distance, 
entered into a covenant with them that he would defend 
them, and never in any way assault them. Though it came 
out after two or three days who they were, it is to the 
honor of Joshua that he kept his word. Still, though he 
did not destroy them, he made the Gibeonites to be hewers 
of wood and drawers of water. 

As soon as it was known to the Amorites throughout 
Palestine and the region to the southeast of the Dead Sea 
that the Gibeonites had made peace with Joshua, and 
betrayed their country's cause, the five great kings of that 
land determined that they would sweep away Gibeon at 
once ; and they called together their men of war in great 



342 BIBLE STUDIES. 

numbers, and drew near to the city, surrounding it. Tiie 
Gibeonites sent to Joshua, imploring him to come to their 
succor; and he went all night from Gilgal, came suddenly 
upon the five kings, defeated them,* and chased them to the 
south, to the west, to the east, and to the northwest. A 
great many people escaped into their fenced cities ; and 
the five kings took refuge in the cave of Makkedah, some- 
what to the southwest of Jericho, Gilgal, and Ai. 

"And it came to pass, when Joshua and the children of Israel had made 
an end of sLi) ing them with a very great slaughter, till they were consumed, 
that the rest which remained of them entered into fenced cities. And all the 
people returned to the camp to Joshua at Makkedah in peace : none moved 
his tongue against any of the children of Israel. Then said Joshua, Open 
the mouth of the cave, and bring out those five kings unto me out of the 
cave. And they did so, and brought forth those five kings unto him out 
of the cave, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, 
the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon. 

"And it came to pass, when they brought out those kings unto Joshua, 
that Joshua called for all the men of Israel, and said unto the captains of 
the men of war which went with him, Come near, put your feet upon the 
necks of these kings. And they came near, and put their feet upon the 
necks of them. And Joshua said unto them, Fear not, nor be dismayed, be 
strong and of good courage : for thus shall Jehovah do to all your enemies 
against whom ye fight. And afterward Joshua smote them, and slew them, 
and hanged them on five trees : and they were hanging upon the trees until 
the evening. And it came to pass at the time of the going down of the sun, 
that Joshua commanded, and they took them dov>'n off the trees, and cast 
them into the cave wherein they had been hid, and laid great stones in the 
cave's mouth, which remain until this very day." 

After this comes the narration of the confederacy in the 
North. By this time Joshua had, with his battles, pretty 
nearly subdued Judah, the land which afterwards became 
Judea. It was a work which, although it is narrated in a 
few chapters, went through several years. It was about 
seven years before Joshua brought to an end his cam- 
paigns, and took possession of the whole land. 

After these campaigns in central Palestine, five more 
** kings " in the extreme north gathered themselves near tlie 
waters of Merom — a small lake north of Gennesaret. It is 
a little to the south of the source of the Jordan, lying, there- 
fore, at the very foot of Mount Lebanon. Here Joshua 



CAMPAIGiXS OF JOSHUA. 343 

entered into battle with the five kings of the North, and 
utterly defeated them, and drove them helter-skelter, 
slaughtered the host, took their cities and destroyed the 
inhabitants of them, and in many cases swept away the 
oxen, the horses, all living things. From the beginning to 
the end, through six years, an annihilating campaign was 
carried on by Joshua, and it is alleged that at every step 
he was acting under the instruction of God. 

The first difficulty that occurs to me in regard to this 
whole matter is the right of the Israelites to take Palestine, 
anyhow. It is said that God had a right to parcel out the 
inhabitants of the land as he pleased ; and if there was any 
evidence of a divine plan by which men were elected ac- 
cording to their merit this would be an entirely adequate 
answer. The power of God to act justly toward nations 
or individuals no man denies. I aver that the right of 
God always moves within the lines of justice and of truth. 
The right of God to do as he has a mind to is to be admitted 
when the mind of God is represented as doing right, but 
under no other circumstances. God has no right to be 
selfish, — less than any other being in the universe. God 
lias no right to be cruel, — less than any other being in the 
universe. God has no right to lie, — less than any other 
being in the universe. He is the Head, the Exemplar ; and 
by as much as he is superior to all other beings he is included 
in those laws which he lays upon men. If he lays upon them 
the law^s of justice, and kindness, and truth, and humanity, 
he himself is bound by those laws ; and to allege injustice, 
cruelty, falsity, and inhumanity as coming from the in- 
spiration of God seems to me, to speak moderately, a very 
great inconsistency. 

That there were wise reasons for dispersing the inhab- 
itants of Palestine I do not deny ; I rather lean to the 
impression that there were such reasons : but not on the 
general ground that God has a right to do with his own 
people what he pleases. I do not believe God thought 
only of the Israelites. There were millions upon millions 
of men on the earth ; and do you suppose God did not care 



344 BIBLE STUDIES. 

for all of them ? Is it your belief that when he looked 
forth upon the world the only people he saw were the 
Israelites ? That is the quintessence of national vanity for 
the Jews ; and for us, of superstition. We are not to sup- 
pose that a thing was right merely because it favored the 
Israelites ; and yet, that was their national feeling, carried 
to an unjustifiable although perhaps natural extent. That 
it was within the divine purpose so to separate one people 
from all others that it should become a schoolmaster of 
generations is an idea not unworthy of our conception as 
a part of God's plan ; and that, in order to the carrying 
out of that purpose, it was necessary that they should be 
penned up, as it were, where they w^ould not be undul}^ 
exposed to those temptations to which all mankind in that 
age of the w^orld were liable, I can conceive to be rational : 
but to say that, to the end that there might be in Palestine 
a school of which the Israelites should be the teachers, the 
other nations must be driven out, and that if they would 
not go out they must be exterminated, is to appeal neither 
to reason nor to common sense. 

I am not satisfied with the theory that God has the same 
" right " to exterminate nations by the hands of other 
nations that he has to destroy men by earthquakes and pes- 
tilences. Destruction by these latter causes falls out under 
God's great natural laws. It is not to be supposed that he 
would make men executioners of destruction. It would 
not seem to be a very wise method of preparing them for 
the coming of Christ, for greater humanity, and for wiser 
civility. And yet there are those who justify the above 
reasoning on the ground that there must be means for the 
accomplishment of ends. They say, for instance, " If men 
are to go to school there must be a schoolhouse ; and if 
that schoolhouse is infested by people who interfere with 
its legitimate use, and they refuse to depart, they must be 
removed." But that does not justify revenge. Moses 
charged the people to wipe out the remembrance of 
Amalek. They were to do it by way of retaliation. It 
has no justification. It was just as bad in Moses as in any- 



CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. 345 

bod}' else, to avenge an old grudge. There* is no worthy 
end to be gained by it. The best that can be said is that 
it was of the spirit of the time. 

It may be that Joshua was justified in taking tlie cities 
of Palestine, it may be that he was justified in the exter- 
mination of those cities ; but he was not justified in heap- 
ing contempt upon the five kings whom he had taken, by 
having liis captains tread on their necks. It was according 
to the liuman spirit of that day ; but it w^as not according 
to the spirit of God, as revealed by Jesus Christ. I lift up 
this conduct before the tribunal of the New Testament, 
and ask whether, in fhe light of the spirit and temper of 
Christ, it can be justified. If you say that by criticising 
such things in the Old Testament we shall destroy the 
force of the Bible on the common people, my reply is that 
if you do not do something to remove the stigma of such 
things from the name of God you will destroy the true idea 
of God himself among thinking people. The attempt to 
save the Bible by destroying God is a poor bargain. 

That there were instructions given, duties prescribed, by 
God, 1 do not doubt ; but that men, in fulfilling those 
duties, in obeying those instructions, brought in many 
human elements I cannot doubt. I will not undertake to 
contravene the laws of justice and humanity by making 
any apologetic argument. I will call things by their right 
names. Cruelty is cruelty ; justice is justice ; love is love ; 
truth is truth ; humanity is humanity. If these nations 
were to be removed " by the hand of God," why were they 
not swept off by a plague or calamity ? Why must three 
million men be made executioners, and go into the promised 
land wet .with blood from their fingers to their shoulders ? 

And yet, we are to bear in mind that the reason of these 
things was not bloodthirstiness. Turn, if you please, to 
the seventh chapter of Deuteronom}^, and see what was the 
impulse from which they sprang— for, although I do not 
think it removes all the difficulties, it certainly in a meas- 
ure explains and alleviates them. It was not simply cruelty 
that inspired them. 



346 BIBLE STUDIES. 

"When Jehovah thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest 
to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee,, the Hittites, and 
the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, 
and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than 
thou ; and when Jehovah thy God shall deliver them before thee ; thou 
shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them ; thou shalt make no covenant 
with them, nor show mercy unto them : neither shalt thou make marriages 
with them ; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter 
shalt thou take unto thy son. For they will turn away thy son from follow- 
ing me, that they may serve other gods : so will the anger of Jehovah be 
kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly. But thus shall ye deal 
with them ; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and 
cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire. For thou 
art an holy people unto Jehovah thy God." 

That does not mean that they were perfect, but that they 
were set apart — that is the meaning of " holy " — to attain 
a morality better than that which had been attained by 
any other people. 

"Jehovah thy God hath chosen thee to ..be a special people unto himself, 
above all people that are on the face of the earth." 

That was the message. 

So, then, the people were not to turn aside from God ; 
and time and time again the reason why the pagan people 
were to be cut off, was that they would corrupt the Israel- 
ites, and turn and lead them away from righteousness ; or, 
that they had already begun to do so.. 

Now, you are to bear in mind that the "jealousy" of 
Jehovah against other gods w^as not an ecclesiastical or 
theological jealousy. The reason why idolatry was so 
accursed, was not that it was a wrong theory of God or 
moral government : the reason was that the god of these 
idolatrous nations was a god fashioned out of their animal 
propensities. They worshiped a god of their lusts. The 
whole service of their gods employed the gratifying of the 
basest passions that can degrade the human body. Licen- 
tiousness was a part of their service. We have a record of 
how, when the Israelites came into the presence, of the 
Midianites, the women of Moab and the women of the 
Midianites, at the suggestion of Balaam, coaxed the people 
of Israel into the commission of Qrross immoralities. It was 



CAMPAIGNS OF JOSHUA. 347 

this corrupting worship, this basilar lust, that made the idol- 
atry of neighboring nations so dangerous to the children 
of Israel. There is nothing so contagious, nothing that 
men can so little resist, nothing that when it comes into 
laxity of public sentiment is so destructive to the virtue 
and stability of a commonwealth, as these sexual abomin- 
ations ; and the Israelites w^ere brought into the presence 
of nations that were saturated with such elements, and 
whose whole religion was a deification of Venus. If the 
Israelites were to settle down among nations like those, the 
experiment of making them a moral people could not be 
made with any hope of success ; and that the Israelites 
might become a powerful nation with households in which 
purity reigned (and, as I have shown, the families of the 
children of Israel have been singular for their purity) was 
one reason for the cutting off, the destruction, of those 
peoples. 

If, then, we want an apology for this career of annihila- 
tion, the best thing we can say is, that a course may be 
right and necessary in the very earliest periods of human 
existence which becomes afterwards, in an advanced state 
of humanit}^, abominable and utterly unjustifiable. Back, 
through thousands of years, in the rude ages of mankind, 
a certain policy may have been allowable which in a later 
age is positively criminal. And we do not know enough, 
in detail, genealogically or specifically, of the nations of 
primitive antiquity, to sit in such rigorous judgment over 
the conduct of Joshua and the armies of Israel as we should 
if we were considering events that took place within the last 
two thousand 3^ears. One thing I know, that this policy 
of early times recorded in the Old Testament, if judged by 
the tribunal of the New Testament, cannot stand for a 
moment. It is foreign to the spirit of Christ. You cannot 
conceive of Christ looking upon such slaughter as is rep- 
resented as having taken place in olden times, and approv- 
ing it. Nor can you reconcile the revelation of a God, 
made known in the shedding of his own blood through his 
Son that the world might be redeemed from sin, with this 



34^ BIBLE SrCDIES. 

account of a God that employed millions of men to shed 
the blood of hundreds of thousands. The light of the New 
Testament thrown upon such transactions condemns them. 

If 5^ou say that in those ancient periods there was no 
opportunity to disclose the fruits of the Spirit that came 
out in the time of Christ, that may be an alleviation ; but 
it will not justify the destruction of men, women, and 
children by hundreds of thousands. If you say that in the 
remote ages there might have been reasons for this which 
we do not know anything about, I assent to that. 

Am I asked, then, " Do you hold that the Old Testament 
is a good book ? Do you hold that it is a profitable book ? " 
I answer : Do you hold that this world is a good and 
profitable world while there are thousands of bad things 
in it ? Certainly it is. The chief tendencies are toward 
right ; the great natural laws work for right : but entangle- 
ments arise from the interference of the human will, from 
the slow and imperfect growth of the moral sense, and from 
other causes. It is a mixed world ; the moral develop- 
ment of men is required to enable them to know what is 
good and what is evil, what is right and what is wrong ; 
and while this development is being wrought out there will 
of necessity be incongruities and inconsistences. You can- 
not make veterans of men that have not been in a fight. You 
must give them a chance to learn before you expect them 
to know. The Old Testament is a history of the educa- 
tion of men, and we are not to suppose that all they did 
was right because they thought God commanded it. We 
are to go through that history and take that which is good 
in the sight of God, and reject that which is not good. 

We are to bear in mind that though the Bible is bound 
up as one book, it is made up of many distinct books, re- 
cording events that took place sometimes a hundred years 
apart, and sometimes a thousand years apart, and that a 
flaw in the validity of one would not make any difference 
with the validity of the rest. Men seem to think that the 
Old Testament is like a man who, if you take his bowels 
out, is gone ; but you can take from the Bible this, that, or 



CAMrAIGXS OF JOSHUA. 349 

the other book without invalidating the remaining books. 
The contents of the Old Testament must stand or fall as 
divinely inspired, according as they agree or disagree with 
the moral judgments formed in the school of Jesus Christ. 
While you will see in the Old Testament the rudeness of 
primary beginnings, the infirmities of a race during the 
period of its childhood, the faults that belong to undevel- 
oped human nature, on the other side you will see that the 
people of God in those far-off ages were aspiring after 
something higher ; that they were endeavoring to follow 
nobler and nobler conceptions ; that they were seeking to 
cleanse themselves from the impurities of heathendom; 
that they were striving after a better national life. The 
tendency, the spirit, of the Old Testament is upward, and 
it is not dragged down by these occasional aberrations or 
exaggerations of human passion. The Old Testament is 
full of material for instruction, and I think that in the 
hands of intelligent men it will be even more operative in 
the future than it has been in the past. 

Meanwhile, let us rejoice that we are living in a time in 
which the light of the New Testament is to be our guide. 
Let us be thankful that our walks are cast in palmier, more 
cheering, and more comforting days than those in which the 
patriarchs stumbled. We do not see men as trees walking, 
as even the early lawgiver did. We are walking in the 
clearer light of the Son of God. We have not, indeed, lived 
up to the revelation that is made of Jesus Christ. We do 
not yet understand the fullness of the meaning of his 
words. We understand the Old Testament, the wisdom of 
it, its utmost stretch ; but the interior spiritual revelations 
made by Jesus Christ, and through his apostles, we have 
not fathomed. The world has not yet come up to a posi- 
tion in which it understands them. The book of John is 
an unfathomable ocean yet, to mankind. The race is not 
ready to take possession of it. 

It is for us, then, neither to deride the Old Testament 
nor to destroy it. We are reverently to read the history 
of the old patriarchs, and, putting a cloak over our shoul- 



3 so BIBLE STUDIES, 

ders, to go backward and cover its nakedness. Those 
that have no regard for it, and that make it a matter of 
ribald, witty, insensate attack, I cannot sympathize with. 
On the other hand, I would not be led away by the extreme 
school who claim that everything recorded in that history 
is right. I would take the great middle ground of dis- 
crimination, and, with the knowledge derived from later 
times, go back and see how the childhood of the hum^an 
race staggered, what men did when they thought they 
were following the commands of God, and how long it 
was before they began to act with superior reason and a 
nobler conscience. 

But let us beware. One utterance of the Saviour has 
in it great meat, — and great warning. 

" Thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shall be brought 
down to hell." 

There may be some excuse for men that lived in their 
passions and appetites, in an early time, to do the things 
they did ; but for us there can be no excuse if we follow 
their example. The clearer our light, the greater our duty. 
For us to fall into the pit in which they of old stumbled 
— for us to be cruel, inhuman, unmerciful, and salacious — 
is thrice a crime, as compared with the criminality of those 
who in the primitive ages walked by doubtful light and 
with uncertain guidance. 



XIX. 
A TIME OF DEGRADATION. 



Before we go on, following the story of the Israelites, 
let us see exactly where we are. Let us get a bird's-eye 
view of this history. The first six books of the Old Testa- 
ment are closely connected. The call of Abraham was the 
starting-point. He dwelt beyond the Euphrates, on the 
east. His own father was an idolater. He was commis- 
sioned to go forth as an emigrant. What the call was we 
do not know in full. Abraham appears as a very notable 
person ; and on the whole, down to the time of Moses, he 
was beyond all odds the noblest man that appeared in the 
drama that was enacting in his time. He was a simple 
shepherd chief ; he gave no literature, he organized no in- 
stitutions, he apparently exerted no other influence than 
that which he put forth as the head of a great family, 
tending toward equity and largeness of mind in human 
life, and a belief in a supreme and invisible God. 

Next came Isaac — doubtless a very sweet and lovable 
man, but colorless and powerless — a mere connecting link 
between Abraham and Jacob. 

Jacob was a politician the first part of his life, and the 
latter part of his life he was a statesman. The politician 
is one that works by expedients, and the statesman is one 
that works according to great principles. In the early part 
of his life Jacob wrought by expedients that would not 
bear the test of modern morality, although then they were 
not considered as disreputable as they are (theoretically) in 
our day. 



Sunday evening, March 30, 1879. Lesson : Psa. Ixxx. 



352 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Then came the heads of the twelve tribes — the sons of 
Jacob ; and the less said about them the better. 

Then there was a period of four hundred years during 
which, so far as any account we haVe is concerned, there 
was no divine guidance. It is as if the Lord God had 
absolutely forgotten the whole set. They sank out of 
view. At the end of that period Moses appeared, and his 
appearance was followed by a romantic history of him and 
his people. He organized them into a commonwealth, and 
conducted them through the great wilderness, where they 
abode as a nomadic nation for a period of about forty 
years, through the whole of which time he may be said to 
have been incubating the laws and institutes, the manners 
and customs, of this great multitude, now increased to mil- 
lions. So long as he lived things went from worse to better, 
steadily. 

Then came the time in which Moses laid down his rule, 
and appointed Joshua to be his successor. Under Joshua 
it was that the whole tract of country bordering on the 
Jordan was taken possession of. 

West and east of the Sea of Galilee is a country very 
much like the lava beds in which our Modoc Indians hid 
themselves — a basaltic neighborhood of most extraordinary 
character, in which were almost inexpugnable cities. Their 
strong defensive positions and the warlike character of 
their occupants called forth the skill of Joshua's leader- 
ship and the courage of the Israelites — a courage which 
was undoubtedly religious. The enthusiasm (some would 
call it the fanaticism of religious faith and zeal) with which 
they plucked from the hands of that warlike people this 
territory is a marvel that is not sufficiently appreciated in 
modern times. It was a wonderful conquest — more so than 
that further south, east of the Jordan, of which we have a 
fuller account. Under the leadership of Joshua the Israel- 
ites passed over the Jordan, and entered upon a series of 
sieges and campaigns, running through a period of from 
six to seven years, during which time the main part of the 
land was taken possession of. Many of the cities were not 



A TIME OF DEGRADATION. 353 

subdued, and the fastnesses in the mountains were still held 
by the occupants ; but substantially the great country was 
conquered from the river Jordan to the Sea on the west, and 
from the desert on the south to the sides of Mount Leba- 
non on the north. At this period it was that Joshua, being 
now one hundred and ten years old, laid down both his re- 
sponsibility and his life. 

It is very remarkable to see how, from time to time, the 
nascent and crude form of the democratic spirit w^as de- 
veloped in this nation. I know not that it was in any 
other. Certainly it was not in any contemporaneous na- 
tion. In great emergencies Moses called together the 
chiefs of the tribes and heads of families, and all the priests 
and officers, and the people, and proclaimed the law and 
the policy, and rolled the responsibility upon them all. In 
some cases it took place in a dramatic form. It did when, 
in fulfillment of the command of Moses, the tribes were 
gathered between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal, and 
the whole law was read to them, and they said Amen to the 
blessings that were to follow obedience, and Amen to the 
curses that were to follow disobedience. That was, in 
some sense, putting to vote to the whole assembled nation, 
as represented by its men, and pre-eminently by its chief 
men, the question of national fidelity to God and national 
fealty to law. 

Now, it is not to be supposed, as the population at that 
time amounted to vast numbers of people, that there could 
be a single assembly in which one man could address 
them all. The proclamation was probably made after this 
fashion : Joshua, or whoever was the chief and responsible 
magistrate, gathered in groups the priests and officers, and 
told them what w^as to be said to the people, and they in 
turn declared to their tribes or sections the word that was 
spoken to them. From them it was distributed to the great 
crowd. And then, at some signal, the voice of the whole 
people — men, women, and children — was lifted up, and with 
thunder, and acclamation such as probably has never been 
known in any nation since, they all bore witness, and gave 
23 



354 BIBLE STUDIES. 

their solemn vows and covenants, committing themselves 
both to the Law and to the procedures that were to fall out 
under that law. 

When Washington retired from tiie magistracy he gave 
his farewell address ; and when Joshua laid down his 
authorit)^ he gave his farewell address. The whole is con- 
tained in the last chapters of the book of Joshua. It con- 
tains some intimations of the state of the people which are 
worthy of our consideration before w^e go further. 

"And Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and called for 
the elders of Israel, and for their heads, and for their judges, and for their 
officers ; and they presented themselves before God. And Joshua said unto 
all the people. Thus saith Jehovah God of Israel." 

Then he went through an inventory of everything that 
had happened, after which he said : — 

" Now therefore fear Jehovah, and serve him in sincerity and in truth : 
and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the 
flood* [that is, the other side of the river Euphrates] and in Egypt ; and 
serve ye Jehovah. And if it seem evil unto you to serve Jehovah, choose you 
this day whom ye will serve ; whether the gods which your fathers served 
that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in 
whose land ye dwell : but as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah. 

"And the people answered and said, God forbid that we should forsake 
Jehovah, to serve other gods : for Jehovah our God, he it is that brought us 
up and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, and 
which did those great signs in our sight, and preserved us in all the way where- 
in we went, and among all the people through whom we passed : and Jehovah 
drave out from before us all the people, even the Amorites which dwelt in 
the land : therefore will we also serve Jehovah ; for he is our God." 

Then rested the historical account ; and Joshua said to 
the people : — 

" Ye cannot serve Jehovah : for he is an holy God ; he is a jealous God ; 
he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins. If ye forsake Jehovah, 
and serve strange gods, then he will turn and do you hurt, and consume you, 
after that he hath done you good. And the people said unto Joshua, Nay ; 
but we will serve Jehovah. And Joshua said unto the people, Ye are wit- 
nesses against yourselves that ye have chosen you Jehovah, to serve him. 
And they said. We are witnesses. Now therefore put away, said he, the 
strange gods which are among you, and incline your heart unto Jehovah 



Beyond the River," says the Revised Version, 



A TIME OF degradation: 355 

God of Israel. And the people said unto Joshua, Jehovah our God will we 
serve, and his voice will we obey. 

" So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a 
statute and an ordinance in Shechem." 

If that was not putting the thing to the vote, if it was 
not an election, I do not know what is one. 

The earliest records, so far as I know, of organized pop- 
ular voting on a large scale, were these appeals to the peo- 
ple, who had presented to them a great national question, 
who adjudicated it, and who by the most solemn act de- 
creed it. 

It seems that, after all their oppressions in Egypt, after 
their wanderings there, and after all their instructions, right 
under the eyes of Moses, these people had been smuggling 
their gods along with them. They were carrying their 
little contemptible godlings in their pockets, as it were ; and 
when Joshua was brought to the leadership he discovered 
it. He found it more and more disclosed after Moses' 
"death ; and he made it a special point before he left his 
position and gave up his responsibility, to expose the peo- 
ple, and bring them to the public declaration that they 
would throw away their idols and worship the one invisible 
and onl}' God. Having done this, he died^ and was buried. 

Joshua was an honest, moral, straightforward soldier. 
He was not a man of ideas, except as to military opera- 
tion ; he was not a man that took in to a very great extent 
the moral truth that existed in the teaching of Moses ; nor 
had he a very full, comprehensive view of the institutions 
of the lawgiver. He was one who, having been a soldier, 
obeyed commands ; and when Moses said "Go," he went; 
and when Moses said " Come," he came. Having obeyed, 
he was fit to command, and Moses retained him to take 
charge of the people, and to drive out the nations that in- 
habited Palestine. It was a bad business in the light in 
which we look at it in modern times. If there is any amel- 
ioration of the fact it is to be derived from the inchoate 
and undeveloped condition of mankind in that remote 
antiquity. 



356 BIBLE STUDIES. 

We may comfort ourselves with the consideration that 
this nation were dispossessing adversaries that had done 
the same thing to nations anterior to themselves, as 
those adversaries had done to still earlier tribes. There 
w^ere no such laws of national rectitude at that time as we 
have now. It was then the habit of men, if they wanted 
anything, to take it if they could. It is very different in 
our day. If we want a thing, we go about getting it with 
infinite pretenses and all sorts of excuses. When we do 
not like the Chinamen, we find a thousand " moral " reasons 
why they should be kicked out. When a nation does not 
like the Jews, it finds " moral " reasons why they ought to 
be ejected. When Germany wants Alsace and Lorraine, 
she sees " moral " reasons w^hy she should possess herself 
of them. But when the Israelites, under the direction of 
Joshua, wanted the territory occupied by other nations, 
they had a simpler and more direct way of getting it. 
There was no complaint ; there was no inquiry ; there were 
no scruples. Joshua obeyed what he understood to be the 
divine command. While he was not a man of broad 
thought nor of deep moral power, he was an obedient, an 
honest, a very thorough man ; soldier-like and true to the 
religious, civil, and military instructions of Moses, his great 
leader. And he was influential ; for it is recorded that 
after his death the influence of Moses and of Joshua that 
had been exerted upon this people continued during the 
lifetime of that generation. 

For a while, then, things went on harmoniously, and 
with a certain degree of prosperity. Then a remarkable 
event took place. When Phinehas — that roaring priest who 
taught with the sword (it is doubtful which w^as the better 
fighter, Joshua or Phinehas) — was dead, and the elders 
that acted under their influence were also dead, there came 
a sudden sinking, prostration, of moral order and religion. 

The record from the first shows no continuity of that 
Providence by which revelations or divine inspirations were 
given, Abraham was called from beyond the Euphrates, we 
know not how many thousands of years after our race be- 



A TIME OF DKCRADATIOX. 357 

gan, who, according to this history, seems to have been the 
first man tliat was inspired. Tlien inspiration lulled ; Isaac 
and Jacob seem to have been only once or twice inspired 
during their lives. It then ceased during the four hundred 
years in Egypt. It began again with Moses, and apparently 
continued till the termination of the regime finished by 
Joshua. Then it suddenly ceased once more, and had only 
the most fitful renewals dowm as late as the tim.e of Samuel. 
Then it blazed out again, and continued until the period of 
David and Solomon, and the prophets that were contempo- 
raneous with the Kings. Then it lulled again, and there 
was no organized, regular, consequent form of inspiration, 
down to the days of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ. 

I shall not to-night go into an examination, which may 
perhaps befit a later occasion, of what were the different 
kinds of inspiration ; but I have called your attention to 
the intermission or long pauses of it, which will give us 
some clew to the theory of the Bible on this subject. 

When Joshua died there was, it seems, no magistrate 
raised up to take his place. There w^as no provision made 
for the leadership of the Israelites. There was no such 
organization of the priesthood as gave them power or 
influence. No means had been instituted for the regular 
education of the people. There was no plan entered into 
for assembling the people that they might choose a ruler. 
Things appear to have been left to take care of themselves. 
The remaining Canaanitish tribes — those that had not 
been cut off — soon began to intermarry with the Hebrews 
throughout the whole length and breadth of the land. 
It is declared that the Israelites gave their daughters to 
the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, 
the Hivites, and the Jebusites, and that these tribes gave 
their daughters to the Israelites ; so that in the early period 
of the residence of the children of Israel in the land of 
Palestine their blood was mixed with the Phenician blood, 
w^hich was the civilized blood of antiquity (for the Pheni- 
cians were the merchants and travelers of their time, and 
the enlighteners of those around about them). And the 



358 BIBLE STUDIES. 

worst of it was that these intermarriages led the Hebrews 
to the adoption of the worship of Baal and of Ashtaroth. 
I shall not go into an explanation of the interior nature 
of these gods : suffice it to say tliat for all modern pur- 
poses you may call Baal Jupiter, and Ashtaroth Venus. 
The worship of Baal and Ashtaroth was most corrupt. The 
true religion was thus for the time overlaid through the 
intermarriages of the Israelites with the other peoples of 
the land. 

What then was the condition into which the children of 
Israel slumped ? It was as if one w^ere traveling on a 
macadamized highway, and it suddenly terminated in a 
mud road ; or, as if from some bluff he slid suddenly down 
into the fathomless mud of the valley below. The Israelites, 
that had been walking on a high plain, seemed, at the 
close of the generation which Joshua led, to plunge down 
into the depths of stupidity, superstition, ignorance, and 
corruption : and I shall read you two histories, simply as 
specimens. 

" There was a man of Mount Ephraim [or the hill country of Ephraim], 
whose name was Micah." 

Ephraim lay very nearly in the region which was after- 
wards called Samaria. It was probabl}^ between Jerusa- 
lem and the southern border of that region. 

" He said unto his mother, The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were 
taken from thee, about which thou cursedst, and spakest of also in mine 
ears, behold, the silver is with me ; I took it." 

That is to say : Mother, that silver about which you 
made such a scolding, I have — I took it. 

"And his mother said, Blessed be thou of Jehovah, my son." 

She did not care so much that the fellow was a thief ; 
but that he had the money, and that she was going to get 
it again, opened the iiood-gates of gratitude, and she 
blessed him. 

"And when he had restored the eleven hundred shekels of silver to his 
mother, his mother said [Now see the piety of it], I had wholly dedicated the 
silver unto Jehovah from my hand for my son, to make a graven image and 
a molten imaffe : now tkerefore T v^mII restore it unto thee. Yet he rcstoied 



A TIME 01' DEGRADATIO.Y. 359 

the money unto his mother ; and his mother took two hundred shekels of 
silver, and gave them to the founder, who made thereof a graven image and 
a molten image ; and they were in the house of Alicah. And the man Micah 
had an house of gods [that is, he had a chapel, a little temple-like room], and 
made an ephod [priest's garment], and teraphim [household idols], and con- 
secrated one of his sons, who became his priest. In those days there was no 
king in Israel, but every man did that which was right in his own eyes." 

There is a very good beginning to show the condition in 
which the people lived. 

"And there was a young man out of Beth-lehem-judah of the family of 
Judah, who was a Levite [He belonged to the regular order : he had been 
set apart in the historic manner. The man Micah was one of the dissent- 
ers, and he had taken his own way of consecrating his own priest in that 
little chapel of the silver gods]. And he sojourned there. And the man 
departed out of the city from Beth-lehem-judah to sojourn where he could 
find a place [He Avas out looking for a parish] : and he came to Mount 
Ephraim to the house of Micah, as he journeyed. And Micah said unto him, 
Whence comest thou .'* And he said unto him, I am a Levite of Beth-lehem- 
judah, and I go to sojourn where I may find a place. And Micah said unto 
him, Dwell with me, and be unto me a father and a priest, and I will give 
thee ten shekels of silver by the year, and a suit of apparel, and thy victuals." 

A very good settlement ! 

" So the Levite went in. And the Levite was content to dwell with the 
man ; and the young man was unto him as one of his sons. And Micah 
consecrated the Levite ; and the young man became his priest, and was in 
the house of Micah. 

" Then said Micah, Now know I that Jehovah will do me good, seeing I 
have a Levite to my priest." 

So you see, having a fine church, a properly ordained 
minister, and great prosperity, as an indication of religion, is 
not modern : it began as far back as the time of the Judges. 
There is here, about morality, not a word ; about rever- 
ence, not a word ; about purity, truth, and justice, not a 
word : but they had set up certain silver gods, they had 
got hold of a regularly ordained Levite, he was settled on 
a proper salary, and they said, " Now we are all right with 
God." Conventional religion ! 

Well, this is not the whole story ; but it is a good door 
by which to enter into it : — 

" In those days there was no king in Israel : and in those days the tribe 
of the Danites sought them an inheritance to dwell in ; for unto that dav all 



360 BIBLE STUDIES. 

their inheritance had not fallen unto them among the trii^es of Israel. And 
the children of Dan sent of their family five men from their coasts, men of 
valor, from Zorah, and from Eshtaol, to spy out the land, and to search it ; 
and they said unto them, Go, search the land : who when they came to 
Mount Ephraim, to the house of Micah, they lodged there. 

" When they were by the house of Micah, they knew the voice of the young 
man the Levite : and they turned in thither, and said unto him, Who brought 
thee hither .-^ and what makest thou in this place? and what hast thou here.'* 
And he said unto them, Thus and thus dealeth Micah with me, and hath 
hired me, and I am his priest. And they said unto him, Ask counsel, we 
pray thee, of God, that we may know whether our way which we go shall 
be prosperous." 

They were out on a stealing-bout, as the account will 
show. Evil men like to have the varnish of religion over 
their acts. These were freebooters, about to commit one 
of the most atrocious of crimes, and they went to have the 
god inquired of, and the god that they went to have in- 
quired of was the one that was made of silver. 

"And the priest said unto them, Go in peace : before Jehovah is your way 
wherein ye go." 

There never was a man that wanted a priest to prophesy 
things otherwise than just as he would like to have them. 

" Then the five men departed, and came to Laish." 

It was perhaps two or three days' journey to the north, 
past the western border of the Sea of Galilee, and up to 
the roots of Lebanon. Laish was a quiet city, as you will 
see, built by the Sidonians, or those that dwelt upon the 
border of the Mediterranean. Tyre and Sidon were cities 
that had but a very narrow strip of cultivatable land by the 
Mediterranean, and they were obliged, as they grew large 
and had a teeming population, to make provision to feed 
themselves by bringing corn from elsewhere. So they 
opened highways to the east, coming through the sides of 
the mountains, and built strong forts ; and in a beautiful 
valley they placed an agricultural colony ; and this colony 
was raising corn and sending it to the seaport to feed this 
commercial people. Such was Laish. 

"They came to Laish, and saw the people that were therein, how they 
dwelt careless, after the manner of the Zidonians, quiet and secure; and 



A TIME OF DEGRADATION. 361 

there was i\o magistrate in the land, that might put them to shame in any- 
thing ; and they were far from the Zidonians, and had no business with 
any man." 

Nobody took any particular interest in them ; they were 
not defended in any way ; they were an agricultural peo- 
ple, and they were a great way from the mother that sent 
them out as a colony. They were a charming morsel. 
And these men were very much like a fox that, after wan- 
dering about in searcH of prey, should return and say, 
'' Yes, I have found where the hens roost. There is no dog 
there. The man is a good sound sleeper. He don't know 
what is going on in the night. And the hens are fat. To- 
morrow we will go and take possession of that hen-roost." 

"And they [the scouts] came unto their brethren to Zorah and Eshtaol : 
and their brethren said unto them, What say ye.'' And they said, Arise, 
that we may go up against them : for we have seen the land, and, behold, 
it is very good: and are ye still? be not slothful to go, and to enter to 
possess the land. When ye go, ye shall come unto a people secure, and to 
a large land: for God hath given it into your hands: a place where there 
is no want of anything that is in the earth." 

They smacked their lips over that God-given providence. 

"And there went from thence of the family of the Danites, out of Zorah 
and out of Eshtaol, six hundred men appointed with weapons of war. And 
they went up, and pitched in Kirjath-jearim, in Judah : wherefore they called 
that place Mahaneh-dan * unto this day : behold, it is behind Kirjath-jearim. 
And they passed thence unto Mount Ephraim, and came unto the house of 
Micah. 

" Then answered the five men that went to spy out the country of Laish, 
and said unto their brethren, Do ye know that there is in these houses an 
ephod, and teraphim, and a graven image, and a molten image } now there- 
fore consider what ye have to do." 

Now for a little pious practice by the way. They must 
have the sanctions of religion. 

"And they turned thitherward, and came to the house of the young man 
the Levite, even unto the house of Micah, and saluted him. And the six 
hundred men appointed with their weapons of war, which were of the children 
of Dan, stood by the entering of the gate. 

" And the five men that went to spy out the land went up, and came in 
thither, and took the graven image, and the ephod, and the teraphim, and 
the molten image : and the priest stood in the entering of the gate with the 



*" The camp of Dan." Rev. Vers jnargin. 



362 BIBLE S TV DIES. 

six hundred men that were appointed with weapons of war. And these 
went into Micah's house, and fetched the carved image, the ephod, and the 
teraphim, and the molten image. 

" Then said the priest unto them, What do ye ? And they said unto him, 
Hold thy peace, lay thine hand upon thy mouth, and go with us, and be to 
us a father and a priest : is it better for thee to be a priest unto the house 
of one man, or that thou be a priest unto a tribe and a family in Israel ? " 

He had a larger call. 

"And the priest's heart was glad, and he took the ephod, and the tera- 
phim, and the graven image, and went in the midst of the people. So they 
turned and departed, and put the little ones and the cattle and the carriage 
before them." 

Having stolen the man's religion, and his priest, and 
utterly cut him off from all divine communications by 
stealing his idols, they were very happy, and now were 
going to execute the word of the Lord on Laish. 

"And when they were a good way from the house of Micah, the men that 
were in the houses near to Micah's house were gathered together, and over- 
took the children of Dan [for Micah did not like it]. And they cried unto 
the children of Dan. 

"And they turned their faces, and said unto Micah, What aileth thee^ that 
thou comest with such a company ? " 

It was impertinent in him. 

"And he said. Ye have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, 
and ye are gone away : and what have I more ? and what is this that ye say 
unto me, What aileth thee .^ 

"And the children of Dan said unto him. Let not thy voice be heard 
among us, lest angry fellows run upon thee, and thou lose thy life, with the 
lives of thy household." 

Good advice ! 

"And the children of Dan went their way : and when Micah saw that 
thev were too strong for him, he turned and went back unto his house. 

"And they took the things which Micah had made, and the priest which 
he had, and came unto Laish, unto a people that were at quiet and secure : 
and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and burnt the city with fire. 
And there w^asno deliverer, because it w^as far from Zidon, and they had no 
business with any man ; and it was in the valley that lieth by Beth-rehob. 

"And they built a city, and dwelt therein. And they called the name of 
the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father, who was born unto Israel : 
howbeit the name of the city was Laish at the first. And the children of Dan 
[Pious souls !] set up the graven image : and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, 
the son of Manassch, he and his sons were priests to the tribe of Dan until 



A TIME OF DEGRADATION. 363 

the day of the captivity of the land. And they set them up Micali's graven 
image, which he made, all the time that the house of God was in Shiloh." 

Consider what is the condition of a people in which a 
transaction of this kind could take place without remark. 
Consider what a degradation they had fallen into. They 
had not lost all sense of religion, but it had degenerated 
into a most stupid superstition. Although they used the 
name of Jehovah, the name of God, yet they made him 
as a molten image to be worshiped ; and others stole it, 
and carried it off on a freebooters' expedition, to plunder 
the quiet agricultural people of the extreme north, and 
then put their idols into a temple there. And they all felt 
happy — all except Micah ; and Micah had to go home with- 
out any religion or any god. The probability is that his 
mother was dead, and had spent all the silver, so that he 
could not make another. 

Well, there is even worse than this ; but I cannot enter 
upon it to-night. " Every man," it says, "did that which 
was right in. his own eyes." You must bear in mind that 
there are no roads known to-day such as were then em- 
ployed except the one from Beyrout to the east : there 
were not roads then, but paths. Wheel conveyances people 
knew nothing about in that mountainous country. There 
was ver}^ little intercourse between the inhabitants of the 
different sections at that time. The Israelites had no Jeru- 
salem ; points outside of the city may have been taken, but 
the stronghold had not. No temple had been built, nor 
was there any central point either of religion or of govern- 
ment. There was no order anywhere thereabouts. The 
rulers, if such they might be called, winked at everything. 

It is true, human nature now is about the same as it was 
then, with the exception of the varnish you put on it. In 
the olden time they did not varnish it. They did what they 
pleased without disguise. And the natural result followed. 

We perceive, in going forward with this history, the 
moral corruption which takes place when men lose the 
restraint of a true God — a God of righteousness. When 
misconception of moral government and of the divine 



364 BIBLE STUDIES. 

nature is sucli as to give a-loose to all their appetites and 
passions, the consequence is not simply personal wrong 
and personal degradation : it works out from the indi- 
vidual into the community. One thing is absolutely cer- 
tain : that a people who are morally corrupt, and worship 
Baal and Ashtaroth, are utterly incompetent to form and 
maintain a government ; and they go into anarchy. If a 
government is maintained over any people it must be an 
absolute despotism, or else it must be a government of 
self-control which lays upon every man the duty of virtue 
and self-denial. As long as the great lawgiver lived, and 
there was a considerable degree of faith in ttie one invisi- 
ble God, Jehovah, who legislated for righteousness and 
upright dealing, so long the Israelitish people could not 
be shaken asunder in the desert by the assault of the 
Amalekites, of the Midianites, of the Moabites, nor of the 
Amorites ; they were compacted together, and strong 
enough to overrun any of the other tribes, and endure 
any hardships that could be brought upon them : but the 
moment they passed out from under that generic influence, 
and began to worship gods that, instead of binding them to 
virtuous living, opened to them the flood-gates of lust, they 
were dissolved, and sins of license and of licentiousness be- 
came characteristic of their whole condition. 

And is there no warning in this episode of the history of 
the children of Israel to us ? Is it possible to maintain a 
sound municipal government where the great majority are 
inclined to avarice, addicted to strong drink, given over to 
their passions, and utterly free from restraint ? You cannot 
maintain a government except on the basis of purity, 
equity, and righteousness. 

We see that so long as there were raised up for the 
Israelites great leaders, it was possible to hold the nation 
to its integrity, but that just as soon as these leaders died 
the nation found itself unable to maintain itself, and ran 
down into a fearful degradation. Where a great body of 
people are ignorant, and where they are comparative!}' non- 
moral, leadership is indispensable to the continuity of their 



A TIME 01< DEGRADATION. 365 

existence and of their prosperity. And'when, by education, 
both intellectual and moral, the rank and file of a whole 
community are lifted up, great men apparently disappear. 
Great men, as we call them, appear chiefly in the early 
stages of civilization. It is often said that we have no 
great men such as lived a hundred or two hundred years 
ago. The fact is, not that there is a paucity of great men, 
but that the whole community has been carried up so high 
that the difference between the best men and the average 
men is far less than it used to be. We have just as able 
men as there ever were, but the distance from the bottom 
to the top is not so great as formerly it was. The bottom 
has been going up. Therefore we have not leaders such 
as those that existed in earlier days. Leaders are not so 
much needed where there is an intelligent people, — except 
in times of great public disturbance, when they reappear. 
The voice of the people may become, and often is, the voice 
of God. But where the great body of the people are igno- 
rant, or superstitious, or immoral, then there is no salva- 
tion for them unless there are great leaders ; and when 
these arise they must necessarily be despotic, arbitrary, 
absolute. 

So then, if a people w^ant great men to lead them, they 
must consent to take them on the condition of their own 
inferiority ; but there is no condition so fortunate for any 
nation as that in which the average education and the 
average morality of the whole community is graded so 
high that the people guide themselves, and public senti- 
ment becomes the Moses and the Joshua. Take care of 
the public sentiment of any community, and you have all 
the leadership that is needful : destroy the public senti- 
ment of any community and you must needs raise up some 
arbitrary leader, some absolute guide. 

Happily, those far distant days of intermittent light have 
passed away. The rude and imperfect methods through 
which the divine will was communicated by men of old were 
like the stammering and lisping pronunciations of children. 
In these later days, not by dreams, not by prophets, but by 



356 BIBLE STUDIES. 

his own son, God has made known his will unto us ; and 
the knowledge of the truth revealed to us through the 
Lord Jesus Christ no longer needs to be in the hands of 
priests. It has entered into the common thought and the 
common feeling of nations, and there is a practical gospel — 
framing laws, carving out institutions, guiding administra- 
tions, and creating public policies. To-day the mind and 
will of God are disseminated, not through select classes, 
not so much by individual teachers, but by and through 
the common sense and the consciousness of the common 
people in Christian nations. And results show that the 
revelations of God through these influences are far more 
effective and enduring than the feeble lights that gleamed 
in antiquity. 



XX. 

GIDEON. 



There were three periods through which the Israelites 
passed before they came to the point of revival under 
monarchy — the period of captivity in Egypt, the period of 
schooling in the great desert, and the period between the 
death of Joshua under the general regime of Moses and 
the time of Samuel. Upon this last period we have en- 
tered already, and our path through it we must pursue for 
the present. 

The time between the death of Joshua and the ascend- 
ency of Samuel and Saul may be considered as a second 
Egypt — the Egypt of Palestine ; for the people sunk into 
gross darkness. They degenerated very rapidly when the 
bonds of a more rigid authority were loosened, and they 
were left to themselves in a great degree ; for now, no 
longer in a camp where, as a congregation, they could be 
overlooked and controlled by the eye and hand of Moses, 
they were scattered up and down through the whole land, 
and were under the dominion of general influences, and 
subject to the workings of that divine method of education 
which is operative upon all nations. I must dissent en- 
tirely from the view of those who undertake to find in the 
evolution of the Israelitish history a specification of divine 
influence that excludes natural causes, or that leaves upon 
the mind the impression that there was toward this people 
an administration that differs in kind from God's adminis- 
tration over every people. It has been assumed, on the 
whole, that natural causes have occupied a very unimpor- 
tant place, — a place not only secondary, but basilar, — and 



Sunday evening, April 13, 1879. Lf.sson : Psa. xx. 



368 BIBLE STUDIES. 

that substantially the Israelites were brooded and developed 
under a special divine influence that differed from that 
exerted on any other nation either before or since. 

Now, I hold that there was a divine communication with 
the Israelites, because I believe there is a divine communi- 
cation with universal humanity, and always has been. I 
therefore am prepared to assent to special messages, to spe- 
cial appearances, to visions, and to miracles or wonders : 
but these were occasional ; in many periods they were 
rare ; and the main instrumentalities by which the Israel- 
itish people evolved from their lovv^ condition to a higher 
estate were great natural causes, as we call them. Chris- 
tian people have been afraid of Nature, and in ignoring 
that element as a divine influence they have struck out of 
God's hand his own scepter. They have been so anxious 
to believe God does things by direct volition that they 
have left out of sight the fact that he organizes and puts 
in operation events and methods by which he influences 
men and nations throughout the whole globe. I believe 
that not only men — in their social conditions and mutual 
influences — but that the climate, that the air, that the 
winds, that the light, that mountains, that stones, that 
water, that birds and beasts, that all things, are God's min- 
isters, his servants, and that it is through their ministra- 
tion, by means of them, that he evolves the results which 
he accomplishes. 

Let us follow out still further the history of the period 
on which we have entered. The Israelites, having lost 
their ordained leaders, became a mob, facile to temptation. 
During that period, in which Israel was broken and carried 
away captive, we shall see a strange mixture. We shall 
discern the steady operation of causes both in their de- 
generation and in their reconstruction. We shall observe, 
sparkling here and there, the mystic light of inspiration. 
It is dramatic to the last degree ; and the record of it is 
most picturesque. We could not afford to lose out of the 
Old Testament that book of Judges, which carries us back 
to the early history of manhood, to the way in which men 



G IDE ox. 369 

lived, and to the method by which God rescued them, or 
sought to do so. 

We begin, this evening, the history of Gideon, and of his 
ministration over Israel. 

The Midianites were descendants of Abraham through 
■ Keturah, and their chief habitation was in northern Arabia, 
tliat skirted the eastern part of the southern line of Pales- 
tine itself. The Israelites, as you remember, had already 
had some dealings with the Midianites. Joined with the 
Amalekites, they were overthrown by the hand of Joshua, 
under the regency of Moses. They seem to have been 
quiet for a time after they were decimated by war ; but men 
breed fast in those Oriental deserts, and though it would 
be supposed that their courage would be broken and their 
force destroyed forever, they were soon found to exist in 
great numbers and with remarkable power. They broke 
over the Jordan, swarming the eastern parts of Palestine. 
The description of their operations is very emphatic. 

You must imagine them as Bedouin Arabs, with their 
tents and their camels, pursuing their vocation as robbers, 
waiting until the people had sowed their fields with barley 
and wheat, until their crops had matured, and until their 
vines were loaded with ripe grapes, and then rushing in 
and taking possession of all their harvests, and levying 
tribute, in an orderly manner. Thus they carried on this 
illicit robbery ; and to such extent did they ravage the 
land that the people, when threshing the grain, did not 
dare to do it by oxen or flail out of doors, but did it in the 
wine-press, that they might hide it from the Midianites that 
hovered around to seize any plunder that lay about loose. 
The Israelites of all the region were driven by these in- 
vaders into the caves and caverns as well as the mountains 
of the limestone region in which they dwelt. They were 
reduced very low, and they had to hide their food, and 
crawl like insects into the rifts of rocks or caverns, in order 
to escape the outrages to which the Midianites sought to 
subject them. It was more thaq human nature could bear. 

Not only had they come to this oppression, but, broken in 
24 



370 BIBLE STUDIES. 

spirit, they had given way to their passions, and gone back 
to the idolatrous and licentious worship of Baal. The 
worship of the true God had disappeared from among 
them. 

But we are told somewhat earlier in the book of Judges, 
first in a sentence that is repeated again and again as if to 
intensify its meaning in connection with the woes that 
came upon the people : — 

"And the children of Israel did that which was evil in the sight of Jeho- 
vah, and served the Baalim. . . . they forsook Jehovah, and served 
Baal and the Ashtaroth. And the anger of Jehovah was kindled against 
Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of spoilers." 

Yet, from time to time, " it repented Jehovah because 
of their groaning by reason of them that oppressed and 
vexed them, and he raised them up judges" — champions — 
w^ho saved them out of the hand of their enemies. We are 
about to look at one of these patriotic heroes. 

" There came an angel of the Lord, and sat under an oak which was in 
Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash the Abi-ezrite: and his son Gideon 
threshed wheat by the wine-press, to hide it from the Midianites." 

The locality is not distinctly known, but it is highly 
probable that it was in the upper border of Aram, near the 
valley of Jezreel — in that general neighborhood. 

"And the angel of Jehovah appeared unto him [Gideon], and said unto 
him, Jehovah is with thee, thou mighty man of valor." 

You take notice that when God calls men he always 
calls men. You cannot find a record of God's calling, for 
any great purpose, a poor, miserable, shiftless wretch. 
When he calls he knows what he wants, and he generally 
calls men that are men from their mother's womb. More 
than that, when a man is a viaji — and because of it — he 
hears God call when nobody else does. 

Gideon was a man of the right sort. He was a patriot. 
His heart burned within him. He deplored the oppression 
of his people. He felt outraged by their idolatry and moral 
degradation. He grieved aver their sufferings. He was a 
just man. And that was the message conveyed to him by 
the angel that appeared to him. 



GIDEOiX. 371 

"And Gideon said unto him, O my lord, if Jehovah be with us, why then 
is all this befallen us ? and where be all his iiiiracles which our fathers told 
us of, saying, Did not Jehovah bring us up from Egypt? but now Jehovah 
hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites. 

"And Jehovah looked upon him, and said. Go in this thy might, and thou 
shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites : have not I sent thee ? " 

It was the last thing that could have entered his mind, 
that he, a common working man, should be sent of God, 
and that he was to be brought to the position of a leader, a 
revolutionist, an emancipationist. He had not thought of 
such a thing before ; so that with this new blaze of religion 
and patriotism firing his soul, he considered the matter 
modestly — as his greater predecessor Moses had done. 

"And he said unto him, O my lord, wherewith shall I save Israel ? behold, 
my family is poor in Manasseh, and I am the least [the youngest] in my 
father's house. And Jehovah said unto him, Surely I will be with thee, 
and thou shalt smite the Midianites as one man." 

If any man feels that he is mightier than a host it is 
when he is conscious that God is with him. But Gideon 
was not flattered, and he was not credulous. 

"And he said unto him, If now I have found grace in thy sight, then show 
me a sign that thou talkest with me." 

It was an uncertain vision. 

" Depart not hence, I pray thee, until I come unto thee, and bring forth 
my present [offering], and set it before thee. 

"And he said, I will tarry until thou come again." 

So Gideon went into the house,, and prepared a kid, and 
some cakes, and brought them out, and put them on a 
stone, and the angel touched them with a rod, and there 
flamed fire, and Gideon was all a-quiver ; for he, in com- 
mon with all his people, was possessed with the idea that 
if any man looked upon divinity it would destroy him. 

"And when Gideon perceived that he was an angel of Jehovah, Gideon 
said, Alas, O lord God ! for because I have seen an angel of Jehovah face 
to face. 

"And Jehovah said unto him, Peace be unto thee; fear not: thou shalt 
not die. 

"Then Gideon built an altar there unto Jehovah, and called it Jehovah- 
shalom [Jehovah is peace]." 



372 BIBLE STUDIES. 

This ,is the opening history. Next it came to pass that 
God told Gideon to open the campaign, to throw down the 
challenge. How was that to be done ? His father, Joash, 
had been probably led away into idolatry, and is supposed 
by many to have been a priest of Baal. 

"Jehovah said unto him [either in a dream or in some other way by which 
he was impressed with it as with a vision], Take thy father's young bullock, 
even the second bullock of seven years old, and throw down the altar of 
Baal that thy father hath, and cut down the grove that is by it : and build 
an altar unto Jehovah thy God upon the top of this rock, in the ordered 
place, and take the second bullock, and offer a burnt sacrifice with the 
wood of the grove which thou shalt cut down." 

The Hebrew word ashera that is translated grove has 
given rise to very much investigation. The general belief 
now is that it represented upright wooden images, or obe- 
lisks that stood for images, of divinities worshiped by licen- 
tious rites — Baal, Ashtaroth, and other such. 

'* Then Gideon took ten men of his servants, and did as Jehovah had 
said unto him : and so it was, because he feared his father's household, 
and the men of the city, that he could not do it by day, that he did it by 
night. And when the men of the city arose early in the morning, behold, 
the altar of Baal was cast down, and the grove was cut down that was by it, 
and the second bullock was offered upon the altar that was built. And they 
said one to another. Who hath done this thing ? " 

You may depend upon it, there was a buzzing. 

"And when they inquired 'and asked, they said, Gideon the son of Joash 
hath done this thing. Then the men of the city said unto Joash, Bring out 
thy son, that he may die : because he hath cast down the altar of Baal, and 
because he hath cut down the grove that was by it." 

It was an attack on their religion. No matter what men 
are doing — though they be wallowing in filth ; though they 
be immoral, corrupt, superstitious, cruel and despotic to 
the last degree — touch their religion, and they will spring 
to its defense. Generally, the worse men are the more 
earnest they are to avenge what they call an insult to their 
religion. Here was their religion oppressing the people 
and treading out their very life ; but when their altar was 
thrown down that was a reason for summoning the whole 
nation to defend that relio:ion. 



CIDEOX. 373 

*' Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the childien of (hecasf; 
were gathered together, and went over, and pitched in the valley of Jezreel." 

This was a little southwest of the Sea of Galilee. It was 
the way of caravans as they went toward Tyre and Sidon 
and the great East. 

" But the spirit of Jehovah came upon Gideon,* and he blew a trumpet; 
and Abi-ezer was gathered after him. And he sent messengers throughout 
all Manasseh ; who also was gathered after him : and he sent 'messengers 
unto Asher, and unto Zebulun, and unto Naphtali [all that region lying at 
the extrem^e north of Palestine] ; and they came up to meet them." 

This was like the gathering of clans. You that have 
read Scott's poetry will remember how the fiery cross was 
sent from tribe to tribe, from clan to clan. What magnifi-.. 
cent descriptions the poet gives of the assembling of the 
Scottish hosts ! That is the way the warlike tribes of old 
were called together. It took place under the command of 
Gideon. He blew the trumpet and brought the gathering 
tribes frotn the north, the east, and the west, for the national 
defense. 

"And Gideon said unto God, If thou wilt save Israel by mine hand, as 
thou hast said, Behold, I will put a fleece of wool in the floor; and if the 
dew be on the fleece only, and it be dry upon all the earth beside, then 
shall I know that thou tv'ilt save Israel by mine hand, as thou hast said. 
And it was so : for he rose up early on the morrow, and thrust the fleece 
together, and wringed the dew out of the fleece, a bowd full of water. 

"And Gideon said unto God, Let not thine anger be hot against me, and 
I will speak but this once : let me prove, I pray thee, but this once with the 
fleece ; let it now be dry only upon the fleece, and upon all the ground let there 
be dew. And God did so that night : for it was dry upon the fleece only, 
and there was dew on all the ground." 

It was a very simple sign, and Gideon was a very simple 
man. Such a sign would not go a great way with you or 
me, because we are in a different age from that in which 
this occurrence took place ; but it was sufficiently re-assur- 
ing to Gideon to give him certitude, faith, — in himself as 
an instrument of God, and in the cause which he was 
endeavoring to serve. Though you call it superstition. 



*The margin of the Revised Version gives the vivid touch of direct trans- 
lation : "clothed itself with Gideon." — Editor, 



374 BIBLE STUDIES. 

nevertheless it did tlie work appointed, and he was satis- 
fied to go forward. 

" Then Jerubbaal, who is Gideon, and all the people that were with him, 
rose up early, and pitched beside the well of Harod : so that the host of the 
Midianites were on the north side of them, by the hill of Moreh, in the val- 
ley." 

It was high ground south of the plain of Jezreel, which 
looked down into that plain. They saw the hosts of the 
Midianites, with their allies, the Amalekites, described as 
being, for number, like grasshoppers — like those swarms of 
locusts with which we are too familiar in our own country, 
and which in the Orient have been observed from time im- 
memorial : Gideon had gathered about thirty-two thousand 
men. 

"And Jehovah said unto Gideon, The people that are with thee are too 
many forme to give the Midianites into their hands, lest Israel vaunt them- 
selves against me, saying, Mine own hand hath saved me. Now therefore 
go to, proclaim in the ears of the people, saying, Whosoever is fearful and 
afraid, let him return and depart early from Mount Gilead. And there re- 
turned of the people twenty and* two thousand." 

Wonderful army ! Twenty-two thousand cowards to 
about ten thousand men of pluck. That explains why 
there were too many of them, and why it was better that 
they should be sent home. 

"And there remained ten thousand. And Jehovah said unto Gideon, 
The people are too many." 

Undoubtedly, of that sort. So he commanded the num- 
ber to be still further reduced, and the test of their fitness 
was very curious. Those that lapped water like a dog 
were dismissed ; those that got down on their knees to 
drink were also set aside ; but those that lapped, putting 
their hand to their mouth, of whom there were three hun- 
dred, he retained, — probably the trained fighters, who knew 
the surprises of battle too well to put their heads down 
beyond quick recovery, but raised the water to their 
mouths with their hands. 

"And Jehovah said unto Gideon, By the three hundred men that lapped 
will I save you, and deliver the Midianites into thine hand: and let all the 
other people go every man unto his [^lace. 



GIDEON. 375 

" So the people took victuals in their hand, and their trumpets : and he 
sent all the rest of Israel every man unto his tent, and retained those three 
hundred men : and the host of Midian was beneath him in the valley. 

"And it came to pass the same night, that Jehovah said unto him. Arise, 
get thee dov/n unto the host ; for I have delivered it into thine hand. Eut 
if thou fear to go down, go thou with Phurah thy servant down to the host : 
and thou shalt hear what they say; and afterward shall thine hands be 
strengthened to go down unto the host. [You will notice how much scout- 
ing and spying for information was done by all these Hebrew warriors.] Then 
went he down with Phurah his servant unto the outside of the armed men 
that were in the host [in the camp]. And the Midianites, and the Amale- 
kites, and all the children of the east, lay along in the valley like grasshoppers 
for multitude; and their camels were without number, as the sand by the 
seaside for multitude. 

"And when Gideon was come, behold, there was a man that told a dream 
unto his fellow, and said, Behold, I dreamed a dream, and, lo a cake of 
barley bread tumbled into the host of Midian, and came unto a tent, and 
smote it that it fell, and overturned it, that the tent lay along. And his fel- 
low answered and said. This is nothing else save the sword of Gideon 
the son of Joash, a man of Israel: for into his hand hath God delivered 
Midian, and all the host." 

When Gideon lieard tliat he was well pleased. He un- 
derstood it. 

"And it was so, when Gideon heard the telling of the dream, and the 
interpretation thereof, that he worshiped, and returned into the host of 
Israel, and said, Arise ; for Jehovah hath delivered into your hand the host 
of Midian." 

Now comes the extraordinary arrangement of the battle. 
At about midnight he divided his three hundred men into 
companies of one hundred each, with not a sword, nor a 
bow, nor a sling, but a ram's-horn trumpet in the right hand, 
and a torch in the inside of a pitcher, as it is called, in the 
other. The pitchers were earthen vessels that protected 
the torches, as a lantern protects a lamp or a candle. They 
were so constructed that the light could not be blown out 
by the wind, and that it could be hidden. Such pitchers 
or lanterns are made yet in Oriental countries in which 
they carry torches or candles. About midnight, when 
the soldiers of Midian slept heavily, the band of Gideon 
came in from three different quarters, and suddenly broke 
their pitchers, and the three hundred torches flashed out 



37^ BIBLE STUDIES. 

upon the host. At the same time the three hundred trum- 
pets sounded ; and if you had ever heard one of those 
trum.pets you would think it migHt wake up a dead man, 
and scare anybody ; but three different bands, looking as 
if they were three different armies, pouring into the camp 
roused the whole host out of their sleep. " The sword of 
Jehovah and of Gideon ! " shouted the three hundred ; and 
the Midianites fled, panic-stricken, turning their swords 
upon one another in their friglit and confusion. 

You must bear in mind how easily any army may be 
surprised and thrown off their guard ; and in the East, an 
army made up of mercurial and excitable people are pecul- 
iarly liable to panics of the most disastrous kinds. So this 
great host, supposing they were about to be consumed by 
these flashing red dragons, rushed headlong ; and as, in 
the confusion, every one thought he was in the hands of 
the enemy, they smote each other, those that survived 
making their way as best they could toward the plains of 
Jezreel and the fords of the Jordan. 

Then Gideon showed himself a general. He sent instant 
messengers throughout all the hill country of Ephraim, to 
the tribes that lived in the neighborhood of these fords, 
and asked them to come down against the Midianites, and 
hold the fords, while he with the tribes already gathered 
was pursuing the routed foe. The result was that only 
about fifteen thousand of that enormous host crossed tlie 
Jordan ; for after the battle was fought, and the enemy 
were broken, every tribe from the north, and from the 
middle and lower parts of the land, rushed out to help 
destroy them. There is no trouble in obtaining recruits 
to an army after the foe is in flight. 

"Come down [he said] against the Midianites, and take before them the 
waters unto Eeth-barah and Jordan. Then all the men of Ephraim gathered 
themselves together, and took the waters unto Beth-barah and Jordan. 
And they took two princes of the Midianites, Oreb and Zeeb [that is to say, 
the Raven and the Wolf. Those were their names, as our Indian chiefs 
have names derived from animals] ; and they slew Oreb upon the rock Oreb, 
and Zeeb they slew at the wine-press of Zeeb, and pursued Midian, and 
brought the heads of Oreb and Zeeb to Gideon on the other side Jordan. 



GIDEoy. ■ 377 

''And the men of Ephraim said unto him [After it was well over, and all 
was sure and safe, their pride was a little hurt that another chieftain of an- 
other tribe had gained this victory], Why hast thou served us thus, that 
thou calledst usnot, when thou wentest to fight with the Midianites? And 
they did chide with him sharply. 

"And he said unto them [It is evident that he was a diplomat as well as a 
general], What have I done now in comparison of you ? Js not the gleaning 
of the grapes of Ephraim better than the vintage of Abi-ezer ? God hath 
delivered into your hands the princes of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb : and what 
was I able to do in comparison of you ? 

" Then their anger was abated toward him, when he had said that." 

A sweet compliment will shut up an angry man's mouth. 

"And Gideon came to Jordan, and passed over, he, and the three hundred 
men that were with him, faint, yet pursuing." 

The Midianite remnant of some fifteen thousand had 
gone up one of the gorges ^nd got upon the table-lands 
beyond into a secure place, had camped dow^n, and were 
sleeping off their fatigue and fright ; for they felt at last 
that they wjere secure ; but Gideon pursued them up 
through this narrow defile, and came upon them unawares, 
and utterly routed and destroyed them. There fell, alto- 
gether, one hundred and twenty thousand Midianites. 

On the way, however, Gideon asked relief and succor of 
those that he met in the road. 

"And he said mito the men of Succoth, Give, I pray you, loaves of bread 
unto the people that follow me; for they be faint, and I am4)ursuing after 
Zebah and Zalmunna, Icings of Midian. And the princes of Succoth said. 
Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna now in thine hand, that we should 
give bread unto thine army ? " 

They did not know but those kings might come back and 
destroy them, and they wanted to be sure that Gideon had 
captured them before they fed his men. 

'' Gideon said, Therefore when Jehovah hath delivered Zebah and Zal- 
munna into mine hand, then I will tear your flesh with the thorns of the 
wilderness and with briers." 

So, too, with the men of Penuel, whose tower he said he 
would break down, because they refused him food during 
the pursuit. Returning from the battle, the victor caught 
a lad of Succoth and got him to describe the chief men of 



37 B BIBLE STUDIES. 

the place ; then he took possession of it, and fulfilled his 
promise that he would tear their flesh with the thorns of 
the wilderness and w4th briers ; arud he did break down the 
tower of Penuel, and slew the men of the city. 

Now comes an inimitable bit of sadness, and light in a 
dark place. The two Midianite kings, as they were called, 
— Zebah and Zalmunna, — were brought before Gideon. 

" Then said he unto Zebah and Zahnunna, What manner of men were 
they whom ye slew at Tabor ? " 

We have no account of that to which reference is made 
except in this question. 

"They answered, As thou art, so were they; each one resembled the 
children of a king. And he said, They were my brethren, even the sons of 
my mother : as the Lord liveth, if ye had saved them alive, I would not 
slay you. 

"And he said unto Jether his firstborn. Up, and slay them. But the 
youth drew not his sword : for he feared, because he was yet a youth. 

" Then Zebah and Zalmunna said, Rise thou, and fall upon us : for as 
the man is, so is his strength." 

They wanted to be slain by a man. Their pride was 
touched by the idea that they were to be killed by a boy. 
There was an admirable element in their bold solicitation 
that they might be granted an honorable death, at the hands 
of a hero. 

As a result of this great deliverance the natural enthu- 
siasm of the people flamed out toward Gideon, and by a 
spontaneous acclamation he was called to be their king. 
And here shone out another noble trait. 

"Then the men of Israel said unto Gideon, Rule thou over us, both thou, 
and thy son, and thy son's son also : for thou hast delivered us from the 
hand of Midian. And Gideon said unto them, I will not rule over you, 
neither shall my son rule over you : Jehovah shall rule over you." 

That is all that is said here, and that is enough. A 
crown was offered him and his descendants, and he put it 
away both from himself and his family, and showed the 
secret of his influence and power — his belief in Jehovah, in 
an invisible God. But then he asked of them that they 
would give him all the ornaments that had been taken from 
their enemies. 



GIDEON. 379 

"And Gideon said unto them, I would desire a request of you, that ye 
would give me every man the earrings of his prey. (For they had golden 
earrings, because they were Ishmaelites.) And they answered, We will 
willingly give them. And they spread a garment, and did cast therein every 
man the earrings of his prey. And the weight of the golden earrings that 
he requested was a thousand and seven hundred shekels of gold; beside 
ornaments, and collars, and purple raiment that was on the kings of Midian, 
and beside the chains that were about their camels' necks, 

"And Gideon made an ephod thereof, and put it in his city, even in Oph- 
rah : and all Israel went thither a whoring after it: which thing became a 
snare unto Gideon, and to his house." 

It is not to be supposed that Gideon sought to set up an 
idol : probably it was a clumsy attempt to construct a 
priestly garment with a breastplate, and an ephod (woven 
"of gold, blue, purple, scarlet, and fine tw^ined linen " is the 
Levitical description) to which the breastplate was at- 
tached ; and it is to be presumed that it was very gorgeous 
and very ample. It is not said that all the gold went into 
it. We cannot conceive that it could have consumed so 
much as was given to him. 

"Thus was Midian subdued before the children of Israel, so that they 
lifted up their heads no more. The country was in quietness forty years 
in the days of Gideon." 

So the Midianites, the Amalekites, with their tribes, pass 
out of the historical record. 

"And Jerubbaal [Gideon] the son of Joash went and dwelt in his own 
house. And Gideon had threescore and ten sons of his body begotten : for 
he had many wives. And his concubine that was in Shechem, she also bare 
him a son, whose name he called Abimelech. And Gideon the son of 
Joash died in a good old age, and was buried in the sepulcher of Joash his 
father, in Ophrah of the Abi-ezrites." 

You see what an irregular state of morals existed re- 
specting the household ; yet when you come upon the 
word "concubine" in the Old Testament Scriptures you 
must not attach to it the same odious meaning which is 
attached to it in our day. There were primary wives and 
secondary wives ; and the secondary wives during the 
early history of the race were legal wives. The}^ preserved 
their moral sense. Their position in the family was ac- 
cording to the custom and permission of the times. They 



8o BIBLE S7VDIES. 



were regular members of the household, although they 
occupied a subordinate station in it. It seems that one of 
the wives, or concubines (secondary wives) of Gideon was 
a Shechemite ; and it was of this foreign wife — foreign 
from the tribes of Israel — that Abimelech was born. After 
Gideon's death he came back to the people and conspired 
with them, and they, taking his part, made him king ; and 
one of his first acts of authority was to slay his brethren, 
the sons of Gideon, of whom there were some seventy. 
Then he went into various wars ; and there w^as rebellion 
against him ; and in quelling that rebellion he besieged a 
city, and made an attack upon it, and a woman threw part 
of a millstone off from the wall and hit him on the head. 
Then he called his armor-bearer, and said to him, — 

" Draw thy sword, and slay me, that men say not of me, A woman slew 
him [Though thousands have died so, stabbed by the tongue, which is worse 
than any sword]. And his young man thrust him through, and he died 
[that he, too, might meet death at the hand of a man]." 

After Abimelech came a succession of governors and 
rulers — Judges — whose acts are not given special record, 
and whose names are merely mentioned. And still the 
children of Israel did that which was evil in the sight of 
Jehovah ; over and again they fell into the hands of their 
enemies ; repeatedly arose champion-judges who recalled 
them from their evil lives and reorganized them for rescue 
and victory ; and again the story revolves, — 

"But it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they turned back, 
and dealt more corruptly than their fathers in following other gods to serve 
them." 

Thus are we brought to the pathetic account of Jephthah 
and his daughter. After that follow the life and feats of 
Samson ; to be succeeded by the rise of the princely power 
of one Samuel. To these I shall begin to call your atten- 
tion next Sabbath evening. 

In looking back, now, upon the events of this dismal 
period of history, I do not know that they are any lower, 
judged by our moral sense, than much of the life that is 
going on around us to-day. Institutions that hide wicked- 



GIDEON. 381 

ness are as prevalent and as low now as ever they were 
known to be before the Flood, or since. There is a very 
respectable representation of Sodom and Gomorrah within 
twenty minutes' walk from the ferry in New York, There 
is beastliness, there are crimes, there are rotten vices, there 
are various forms of wickedness, festering in many and 
many a district close at hand, such as never were known in 
antiquity. 

Take the tenement houses in New York. While they 
contain, perhaps, a population of five hundred thousand 
people, probabh^ more than one hundred thousand of these 
are vice- and crime-breeders. The professors of medical 
institutions tell us that the diseases bred in these wretched 
lazar-houses are so various and so numerous that medical 
students are attracted to them as places where they can 
acquaint themselves with disorders that cannot be found 
in any other city in the land. And this multitude of crime- 
breeders fill our courts and jails and hospitals with human 
beings that probably stand lower in their moral conditions 
than any class in antiquit}^ 

In the olden time people lived out of doors, and their 
lives were disclosed. They feared no man. Every one 
did that which was right in his own sight. Their acts were 
open, so that everybody, could see them. The same kind 
of wickedness which they perpetrated is to a great extent 
indulged in to-day, only it is restrained by public sentiment 
and by police regulations. It is not at all to be wondered 
at that there was such wickedness in those ancient days. 
It certainly ought not to be wondered at by those who are 
familiar with the lives of multitudes of men in our modern 
cities. It was there, but it was not separated from the 
good. It was not repressed by law. Therefore it was like 
deadly poison filling the air with its destructive exhalations. 

It was out of such material that the church came. Who 
would ever think, on opening the ground, and seeing the 
black dirt and manure, and casting the seed into it, that 
out of such filth there would come the fair stem and the 
pure, clean, white blossom, so fragrant and so beautiful ! 



382 BIBLE STUDIES. 

And who, looking back into those pest holes of antiquity, 
so feculent with the depravity of the human passions, would 
suppose could come from them' the glorious fruits of the 
gospel ! Yet, in that matchless picture gallery, the eleventh 
of Hebrews, among the heroes held up to view are Rahab, 
the harlot, Barak, the general, Gideon, Jephthah, and Sam- 
son, and such as they, who were, after all, brought up in 
households of idolatry, and surrounded by all that was 
impure, but who believed in an invisible God. They had 
that saving quality which can come from nothing but the 
spiritual element. Show me a man who has no conscience, 
no heaven-born impulses, no sense of infinity, and I will 
show you a man who is unquestionably devoid of heroism. 
Show me a man who has these attributes, and I will show 
you a man who, though he may never be a hero, has in him 
that stuff from which, under favoring circumstances, heroes 
are made. 

Let us bless God that the conditions in our well organ- 
ized institution of the family, and that the influences which 
surround us in the street, are such as to inspire us to aim 
at higher and nobler lives ; and may we realize the respon- 
sibility which is laid upon us by our superior privileges to 
contribute to the elevation of others who are less fortunate 
in these respects than ourselves. • 



XXI. 

JEPHTHAH. 



In continuing these early tracings of the Scriptures, the 
more one reads them the more he feels the distance which 
there is between the Old Testament and the New. It is 
not a distance of time alone. The moral distance is even 
greater than the distance in chronology. The characters 
that rise up in the Old Testament are simply impossible to 
the New Testament history. We cannot conceive of any- 
thing that wou'ld be more astonishing than a character in 
the Gospels like that of the hilarious giant Samson, whose 
history will follow this, delineated from life, with his biog- 
raphy. The anachronism would be shocking. It would 
jar like discord in a symphony. Such a character does not 
belong to the New Testament age, nor to the New Testa- 
ment style of thinking. Samson was a primitive man. So 
was Jephthah. All others who lived at the time when the 
history recorded in the book of Judges was enacted were 
primitive people. Even the prophet Samuel would be 
greatly out of place as one who figured in New Testament 
times. You could not connect him with any of the Apostles, 
and still less could you connect him with the Master. Con- 
ceive, for the moment, of that stern old priest bearing iron 
rule, and sitting at the feet of Jesus ; it would be like one 
of the gigantic Egyptian figures sitting before Apollo in the 
Grecian sculpture, — strong, harsh, rude, in contrast with 
perfection of beauty, inwardly and outwardly. 

So then we find a great deal to learn, and very little to 
copy, in these ancient records. There is much that excites 



Sunday evening, April 20, 1879. Lesson : Psa. cxli. 



384 BIBLE STUDIES. 

admiration and sympathy, but scarcely anything for imi- 
tation. The virtues of those of whom we read as having 
lived in the remote past were virtues that broke out in 
great power from untrained natural affections and gifts : 
but of that which we mean by grace, or of that which is 
the fruit of spiritual culture, begun early and continued 
through life, they had none. There was no provision for 
it — none in the Mosaic economy, and none in the institu- 
tions which we have spoken of thus far. For mxorality, 
yes ; a great deal : and for that simple, single strain of 
religion which teaches man to look Godward, yes : but for 
the higher and liner grace of spirituality, no. That grew up 
apparently by and by of itself. That is to say, under that 
dispensation of Providence by which the best things are 
steadily evolved out of inferior things, gradually the world 
came to institutions higher and to culture deeper, and 
finally through Jesus Christ to a spirituality loftier than 
any that had been known on earth before. 

There were three dramas enacted. I despair of being 
able, as I desired, to group them to-night, and present 
them in their threefold aspect. They are the three dramas 
that close the book of Judges. 

They were geographically located at wide distances from 
each other. They are, first, the history of Jephthah, which 
took place on the eastern side of the Jordan ; second, the 
history of the exit or partial exit of the tribe of Benjamin, 
which took place near the middle of Palestine ; and, third, 
the history of Samson of the tribe of Dan, on the western 
border of that country, touching the very sea. That of 
Jephthah is in some respects more remarkable, having a 
deeper tragical element, with less rudeness, than either of 
the others. 

Jephthah was an illegitimate child. When he grew to 
man's estate his father's other sons — his brothers — con- 
ceived against him a violent prejudice. Undoubtedly it 
arose from the strength of his character. Jephthah was a 
great man — or, as the record has it, a might}^ man of valoi" 
■ — and they expelled him from the family. 



JEPHTHAH. 385 

"Thou shalt not inherit in our father's house ; for thou art the son of a 
strange woman." 

Family pride is a moral element which may be very cruel 
at times, but which yet is eminently conservative. It is a 
means of preserving honor ; often it brings to bear upon 
men motives that hold them up when all other exterior 
things fail : and we cannot blame the brethren that they 
should not want the son of a strange woman to inherit 
with the legitimate children of the household. 

" Then Jephthah fled from his brethren, and dwelt in the land of Tob." 

Nobody knows v/here Tob was. Most likely it was in 
the extreme south of Moab, and on the borders of Arabia 
Petraea. 

When Jephthah was thus expelled he became a chief — 
that is to say, a head-robber — and levied on the weak for 
all that was necessary to support himself and the folknvers 
who soon flocked to his leadership. We should have called 
him a freebooter. That calling v/as never very respecta- 
ble, but it was much more nearly so in those days, when 
every man did that which was right in his own eyes, when 
no legitimate cause of action was deemed essential, and 
when nations had nothing to do but to eat each other up. 
Jephthah only did on a small scale that which nations were 
doing on a large scale. It did. not seem so bad then as it 
does now, measured by our modern ideas ; and we must 
not carry back our moral judgment to critically judge of 
the characters of men or their dealings then ; for though 
cruelty is always cruelty, injustice is always injustice, and 
wickedness is always wickedness, yet the judgments which 
we pass upon relative wickedness, injustice, and cruelty 
vary in different ages, according to the degree of light and 
development which prevails ; and at that time there was 
very little light and development, and a glorious oppor- 
tunity for wrong-doing. 

"And it came to pass in process of time, that the children of Amnion 
made war against Israel. And it was so, that when the children of Amnion 
made war against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to fetch Jephthah out of 
25 



386 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the land of Tob : and they said unto Jephihah, Come, and be our captain, 
that we may fight with the children of Amnion." 

Then follows an exhibition of Vvhat you will find in 
Jephthah's character all the way through — brilliant com- 
mon sense and sound reasoning. Though he was a man of 
violence, a rude man, you will be struck that at every step 
reason ran before his hands or his feet, and he acted along 
a line of thought. 

"And Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead, Did not ye hate me, and 
expel me out of my father's house ? and why are ye come unto me now 
when ye are in distress ? 

"And the elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah, Therefore we turn again 
to thee now, that thou mayest go with us, and fight against the children of 
Amnion, and be our head over all the inhabitants of Gilead." 

Now comes his forethought again. It was quite enough 
to be turned out once. He did not mean to run the chance 
of a second expulsion after he had delivered them, and so 
he comes to terms with them. 

"And Jephthah said unto the elders of Gilead, If ye bring me home again 
to fight against the children of Amnion, and Jehovah deliver them before 
me, shall I be your head [I, a bastard, an exile, and an outcast] ? " 

He put it to them, whether they wanted to serve them- 
selves by him at a pinch, or whether they meant that he 
should be their head as an established thing. He was de- 
termined that it should be understood that if he led their 
armies to victory he should have the glory and the au- 
thority. 

" The elders of Gilead said unto Jephthah, Jehovah be witness between 
us, if we do not so according to thy words." 

That was something worth while. 

"Then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made 
him head and captain over them : and Jephthah uttered all his words before 
Jehovah in Mizpeh." 

The Ammonites, it seems, had not actually commenced 
the invasion ; they were gathering their forces : and the 
first step that Jephthah took was diplomatic. He sent out 
word to them, asking them why they were making war 
upon him and his people, and disturbing their peace. 



JEPIITIIAIL 3S7 

" What hast thou to do with me, that thou art come against me to fight 
in my land ? " 

He had assumed, now, not simply the position but the 
tone of ro5'alty. 

"The king of the children of Amnion answered unto the messengers of 
Jephthah [and the answer seems at first to have been a perfectly satisfactory 
one], Because Israel took away my land, when they came up out of Egypt^, 
from Arnon even unto Jabbok, and unto Jordan : now therefore restore 
those lands again peaceably." 

If I were to read no further, everybody would say, ''Well, 
they had the right of it ; those were the lands of their 
fathers." 

"And Jephthah sent messengers again unto the king of the children of 
Anmion : and said unto him, Thus saith Jephthah : Israel took not away 
the land of Moab, nor the land of the children of Ammon." 

That is to say, Israel did not take it away ruthlessly or 
unjustly. Then he recites the history. 

"When Israel came up from Egypt, and walked through the wilderness 
unto the Red Sea, and came to Kadesh; then Israel sent messengers unto 
the king of Edom, saying, Let me, I pray thee, pass through thy land : but 
the king of Edom would not hearken thereto. And in like manner they 
sent unto the king of Moab: but he would not consent : and Israel abode 
in Kadesh. Then they went along through the wilderness, and compassed 
the land of Edom, and the land of Moab, and came by the east side of the 
land of Moab, and pitched on the other side of Arnon, but came not within 
the border of Moab : for Arnon was the border of Moab. And Israel sent 
messengers unto Sihon king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon ; and 
Israel said unto him, Let us pass, we pray thee, through thy land into my 
place. But Sihon trusted not Israel to pass through his coast [his border] : 
but Sihon gathered all his people together, and pitched in Jahaz, and fought 
against Israel. And Jehovah the God of Israel delivered Sihon and all his 
people into the hand of Israel, and they smote them : so Israel possessed 
all the land of the Amorites, the inhabitants of that country. And they 
possessed all the coasts of the Amorites, from Arnon even unto Jabbok, 
and from the wilderness even unto Jordan. 

" So now Jehovah the God of Israel hath dispossessed the Amorites from 
before his people Israel, and shouldest thou possess it?" 

The argument is very conclusive : " You say you are 
going to get back your old country that we have wrested 
from you ; but how came it to be in our possession ? You 
would not permit us to go througli it ; and when we made 
a circuit clear around about Moab and the Amorites, and 



388 BIBLE STUDIES. 

endeavored to pass by in the most peaceable manner, they 
sought our extermination, and we defended ourselves, and 
overthrew your fathers, and took* your lands by a war 
which you yourselves brought on. It was not Israel, it 
was Jehovah the God of Israel, who took your land. Now, 
do you expect to get it back -again ? " 

Then he makes an argument ad Jiominem. He throws 
the responsibility of their own god home upon them. 
"Whenever you go out under the direction of your god 
and gain a land by victory, do not you think yourselves en- 
titled to it?" 

" Wilt not thou possess that which Chemosh thy god giveth thee to 
possess ? So whomsoever Jehovah our God shall drive out from before 
us, them will we possess." 

He w^as ready to honor either of the titles. He recognized 
their divine Providence and that of the Israelites : but 
claimed precedence for his own God. 

"And now art thou anything better than Balak the son of Zippor, king of 
Moab .'' did he ever strive against Israel, or did he ever fight against them .? 
While Israel dwelt in Heshbon and her towns, and in Aroer and her towns, 
and in all the cities that be along by the coast of Arnon, three hundred 
years ; why therefore did ye not recover them within that time .'' " 

Possession is more than nine-tenths of the law, when 
possession is by the sword. 

" Wherefore I have not sinned against thee, but thou doest me wrong to 
war against me : Jehovah the Judge, be judge this day between the children 
of Israel and the children of Amnion. 

" Howbeit the king of the children of Amnion hearkened not unto the 
words of Jephthah which he sent him." 

Thus far the diplomatic passage was carried before the 
war. Jephthah was on the defensive. He was not anxious 
to fight, but he justified the title of his people, and argued 
that if it was not just it ought to have been shown long 
before. The Israelites had dwelt there for three hundred 
years, they had gained a right to the lands by a protracted 
period of undisturbed possession, and the Ammonites had 
forfeited their title to them by non-use. 

This discussion resulted in no agreement, and the war 
was to go on. So Jephthah gathered his hosts. They had 



JEPIITIIAII. 389 

a general ; but they were superstitious, — for you find that 
an unintelligent religion is always superstition, — and there 
must be a vow and a covenant made with their God. 

"And Jephthah vowed a vow unto Jehovah, and said, If thou shalt with- 
out fail deliver the children of Amnion into mine hands, then it shall be, 
that whatsoever* cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I 
return in peace from the children of Amnion, shall surely be Jehovah's, and 
I will offer it up for a burnt offering." 

He had no business to make such a vow; and he had no 
business to keep it when it was made. No man has a 
right to break a pledge that he has unwdttingly made, in 
respect to things that are moral, and are within the right- 
ful control of his will. If, therefore, a man has made a 
vow, or covenant, or promise, without sufficient forethought 
of things that might come to pass, he must not draw back 
w^hen he finds that it is to his damage ; he must fulfill it, 
though it mulcts him, though it impoverishes him, so long 
as it is within the range of ordinary morality. But no man 
has a right to make a promise or covenant or vow that is 
extra-moral, outside of permission. Where a man makes a 
blind covenant, taking the chances of the future, it opens 
endless doors to possibility, and he has no right to keep 
that covenant when it may involve others in the grossest 
wrong, cruelty, or injustice. So, I repeat, Jephthah had no 
right to make the vow he did, it was morally improper ; 
and he had no right to keep it, under the circumstances. 
If keeping it would have brought damage simply upon 
himself, it would have been his duty to keep it ; but if one 
makes a vow that is wrong, he only makes it worse by 
keeping it, Jephthah, however, being superstitious, kept 
the covenant he made, though it was wrong. 

" So Jephthah passed over unto the children of Amnion to fight against 
them; and Jehovah delivered them into his hands. And he smote them 
from Aroer, even till thou come to Minnith, even twenty cities, and unto 
the plain of the vineyards, with a very great slaughter. Thus the children 
of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel." 

Jephthah, flushed with victory, turned his steps home- 



* Or ''whosoever." Rev. Vers. via7'gi7t. 



390 BIBLE STUDIES. 

ward. He was a redeemed exile. He should no longer en- 
dure the scorn of his brethren. He was now their head — 
the head of the house ; more, he was the redeemer of his 
tribe and of his people, and their head also. And with 
what exultation, with what wild joy, did this heroic man 
approach his home ! He had forgotten, doubtless, his 
vow ; or, if he thought of it, he probably marveled what 
might be the first thing he should meet. It might be some 
of the flock of sheep, straying out upon the way in which 
he should come. 

But no, it was his daughter ! 

" Jephtbah came to Mizpeh unto his house, and, behold, his daughter 
came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances : and she was his only 
child; beside her he had neither son nor daughter." 

AVas there ever, since the world began, such a damsel, 
and such music, that greeted the eyes and ears of a father, 
as this sweet girl with her joyous dancing and her tim- 
brels ! Was there ever such a cruel dance as that with 
which she came out, bearing laurels in her hands to en- 
circle the brow of her victorious father ! With joy in her 
eyes, and love in her heart, and triumph on her brow, she 
went forth to meet him. The sight of her smote him as 
with a poisoned arrow. It fell upon him as darkness and 
midnight. 

"And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said, 
Alas, my daughter ! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of 
them that trouble me : for I have opened my mouth unto Jehovah, and I 
cannot go back." 

He was held fast by the terrible rashness of his vow. It 
was wrong ; but he thought it was right. He sacrificed 
every instinct of a father, he trampled upon the strong 
feelings of a parent toward a child that he loved more than 
his own life, under the power of superstition. By this 
power were overruled in him all the great guiding prin- 
ciples of nature. 

Now the daughter shines out beautiful as a star when 
the storm is lifted upon the horizon. There is not a love- 
lier phase, there is not a sweeter exhibition of woman's 



JEPIITIIAH. 391 

nature, in the whole compass of sacred history. There 
was no shock, no wild protest, no breaking down in grief. 
She sunk herself in the joy of her country and in the 
glory of her father. 

" She said unto him, My father, if thou hast opened thy mouth unto 
Jehovah, do to me according to that which hath proceeded out of thy mouth." 

Is there anything grander than that in human history ? 
It was his only daughter, of tender years. 

" Forasmuch as Jehovah hath taken vengeance for thee of thine enemies, 
even of the children of Amnion." 

" My country has been saved, my father has been victo- 
rious, and what matters it what becomes of me ? Let him 
fulfill his vow." Such was her thought. 

"And she said unto her father, Let this thing be done for me: let me 
alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and 
bewail my virginity, I and my fellows." 

In a land where to be wed and become a mother of chil- 
dren was the highest earthly felicity, to be cut off in the 
morning of life, without conjugal love and household joy, 
was the greatest misfortune, and her only petition was 
this : " Since I must die thus, let me go and prepare 
myself hy mourning and meditation in the mountain." 

Dear child ! She saw no little ones around her table, 
she experienced no love and no gratitude in a household 
in which she was the honored wife and mother ; but to the 
end of the world thousands and tens of thousands will lift 
up their hearts in admiration and in praise of her. Her 
name has gathered to itself that which, if she had lived in 
the ordinary way of human life, she would never have in- 
herited. 

"And he said, Go." 

If there was ever anything vexatious in connection with 
this account, it is the attempt of commentators, for the last 
two hundred years, to regulate the Old Testament by the 
ethics of the New, and to show that because the keeping 
of his vow by Jephthah would have been a cruel and wan- 
ton thing, it is not probable that he did it, making believe, 



392 BIBLE STUDIES. 

that instead of sacrificing his daughter he dedicated her to 
eternal virginity m some retreat on the mountains. 

You must bear in mind that among the peoples and in 
the time of Jephthah, and in the land where he lived, the 
sacrifice of men or their children v\^as common. It was in 
accordance with the law. In close contiguity with that 
scene we have this record. 

"When the king of Moab saw that the battle was too sore for him, he 
took with him seven hundred men that drew swords, to break through even 
unto the king of Edom : but they could not. Then he took his eldest son 
that should have reigned in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering 
upon the wall. And there was great indignation against Israel : and they 
departed from him, and returned to their own land." 

Here, within a very short period, was the instance of the 
sacrifice by the king of Moab of his eldest son, to pro- 
pitiate the adverse god. We read in Micah that Balak 
offered to slay his eldest son if God would give him vic- 
tory over the Israelites. Jephthah, who was living in that 
very region, and among this very people, made a covenant 
which amounted to a vow to sacrifice his only child. In- 
deed, the offering of Isaac by Abraham was a sort of 
shadow of that which prevailed throughout that land. 

Unquestionably the daughter of Jephthah came back to 
her father's house, and gave up her sweet life, and was 
offered upon the altar as a lamb in sacrifice. A beautiful 
creature ; a very sad death ; but one of the sweetest of the 
scenes that lie along the mountains and rugged defiles of 
the Old Testament. 

"And it eame to pass, at the end of two months, that she returned unto 
her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed : and 
she knew no man. And it was a custom in Israel, that the daughters of 
Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four 
days in a year." 

There is only one more scene in the life of Jephthah, and 
that, too, is characteristic. You will recollect that, in the 
history of Gideon, after he had gained the victory by which 
he had rescued his country, as soon as he had taken the 
fords of the Jordan, and slain the common enemy, the 
Ephraimites arrogantly and enviously turned on him be- 



JEPIITHAIL 393 

cause they had not been in the battle, and said it was his 
fault. Precisely that identical thing takes place again. 

"The men of Ephraim [the same tribe] gathered themselves together, 
and went northward, and said unto Jephthah, Wherefore passedst thou over 
to fight against the children of Ammon, and didst not call us to go with 
thee ? we will burn thine house upon thee with fire." 

Jephthah, instead of retorting, uses reason once more. 

" I and my people were at great strife with the children of Ammon ; and 
when I called you, ye delivered me not out of their hands. And when I 
saw that ye delivered me not, I put my life in my hands, and passed over 
against the children of Ammon, and Jehovah delivered them into my hand: 
wherefore then are ye come up unto me this day, to fight against me ? " 

The Ephraimites had gone beyond the Jordan into the 
land of Gilead, to seek him. 

" Then Jephthah gathered together all the men of Gilead, and fought 
with Ephraim : and the men of Gilead smote Ephraim, because they said. 
Ye Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim among the Ephraimites, and among 
the Manassites." 

There was a feud between these two peoples. They 
were essentially of the same stock. The Ephraimites had 
possession on both sides of the Jordan. It was said of 
those on the east side — the Gileadites — that they were 
fugitives. 

"And the Gileadites took the passages of Jordan before the Ephraimites : 
and it was so, that when those Ephraimites which were escaped said. Let 
me go over ; that the men of Gilead said unto him, Art thou an Ephraimite ? 
If he said, Nay ; then said they unto him, Say now Shibboleth [meaning, 
probably, " a stream," and referring to the Jordan, which separated the two 
peoples] : and he said, Sibboleth : for he could not frame to pronounce it 
right." 

It was like the failure of a German or a Frenchman to 
correctly pronounce some English word. Instead of giving 
the sound of h with that of i", the Gileadite made a simple 
hiss, and so betrayed his hostile nationality. 

"Then they took him, and slew him." 

They slew him because he could not say Shibboleth ; and 
that kind of slaying has been going on ever since. When 
in the ordinances men cannot say Shibho\.^X\\, but say Sibho- 
leth, they are slain with the sword of the church. Since 



394 BIBLE STUDIES. 

there have been Christian denominations they have not 
given over making war one upon another on grounds as 
narrow as that between shih and sib. Every one mounts 
his conscience on some doctrinal distinction ; and then the 
devil is riding on it, — for a fiery conscience is nearer like 
the devil than anything else that we know anything about. 

" Jephthah judged Israel six years. Then died Jephthah the Gileadite, 
and was buried in one of the cities of Gilead." 

The next account to which we come is that terrible one 
which is given in the nineteenth of Judges, and which is fit 
to be made known only because it gives such a portrayal 
of the whole way of life at that time. It is very hard for 
us to see how the Israelites were under a special providence, 
when we consider that they went through a period of 
three or four hundred years almost totally without any 
indications of leadership, except these sporadic local fight- 
ing-chiefs called judges, and that they left such an odious 
history as here follows. 

" It came to pass in those days, when there was no king in Israel, that 
there was a certain Levite sojourning on the side of Mount Ephraim, who 
took to him a concubine [a kind of secondary wife] out of Beth-lehem- 
judah." 

It seems that they had a quarrel, and she went home to 
her father. He could not live with her, nor could he live 
without her ; and that is often the case. 

"And her husband arose, and went after her, to speak friendly unto her, 
and to bring her again [Time and distance are oftentimes the best poul- 
tices for family difficulties], having his servant with him, and a couple of 
asses : and she brought him into her father's house [She seems to be pla- 
cated now] ; and when the father of the damsel saw him, he rejoiced to meet 
him." 

Nov/ comes a scene of great conviviality. 

"And his father-in-law, the damsel's father, retained him ; and he abode 
with him three days : so they did eat and drink, and lodged there." 

That was all they had to do for amusement in those days. 

" It came to pass on the fourth day, when Ihey arose early in the morn- 
ing, that he rose up to depart : and the damsel's father said unto his son-in- 
law, Comfort thine heart witli a morsel of bread, and afterward go your 
way. And they sat down, and did eat and drink both of them together, for 



JErHTilAl/. 395 

the damsel's father had said unto the man, Be content, I pray thee, and tarry- 
all night, and let thine heart be merry. And when the man rose up to de- 
part, his father-in-law urged him : therefore he lodged there again." 

They had a bout — a three days' bout. 

/* He arose early in the morning on the fifth day to depart : and the dam- 
sel's father said, Comfort thine heart, I pray thee." 

He was a good-natured, merry, hospitable old fellow. 
He was fond of good company, he liked this man, — who 
was probably a likable man. 

"And they tarried until afternoon, and they did eat, both of them. And 
when the man rose up to depart, he, and his concubine, and his servant, his 
father-in-law, the damsel's father, said unto him. Behold, now the day draw- 
eth toward evening, I pray you tarry all night : behold, the day groweth to 
an end, lodge here, that thine heart may be merry : and to-morrow get you 
early on your way, that thou mayest go home. But the man would not tarry 
that night, but he rose up and departed, and came over against Jebus, which 
is Jerusalem ; and there were with him two asses saddled, his concubine also 
was with him. And when they were by Jebus, the day was far spent ; and 
the servant said unto his master, Come, I pray thee, and let us turn in into 
this city of the Jebusites, and lodge in it. And his master said unto him, 
We v/ill not turn aside hither into the city of a stranger [You will recollect 
that Jebus, Jerusalem, was not subdued till after the time of David], that is 
not of the children of Israel ; we will pass over to Gibeah." 

That was one of their own country-place towns. 

"And he said unto his servant, Come, and let us draw near to one of these 
places to lodge all night, in Gibeah, or in Ramah. And they passed on 
and went their way; and the sun went down upon them when they were by 
Gibeah, which belongeth to Benjamin. And they turned aside thither, to 
go in and to lodge in Gibeah : and when he went in, he sat him down in a 
street of the city [according to the way of the East] : for there was no man 
that took them into his house to lodging." 

In that age and in that land inhospitality was a lack 
of humanity. In most places, even then, a stranger under 
such circumstances would have been invited to tarry; but 
it seems that in this city of unmitigated wickedness, 
Gibeah by name, the people were reduced to a condition 
as bad as that of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. 

"And, behold, there came an old man from his work out of the field at 
even, which was also of Mount Ephraim ; and he sojourned in Gibeah : but 
the men of the place w^ere Benjamites. And when he had lifted up his eyes, 
he saw a wayfaring man in the street of the city: and the old man said, 



39^ BIBLE STUDIES. 

Whither goest thou ? and whence comest thou ? And he said unto him, We 
are passing from Beth-lehem-judah toward the side of Mount Ephraim ; from 
thence am I : and I went to Keth-lehem-judah, but I am now going to the 
house of Jehovah ; and there is no man that receiveth me to house. Yet 
there is both straw and provender for our asses ; and there is bread and 
wine also for me, and for thy handmaid, and for the young man which is 
with thy servants : there is no want of anything," 

In other words, " I am not a pauper ; I am not begging 
for anything ; I have all that I want ; I am not seeking for 
anything but shelter." 

"And the old man said, Peace be with thee ; howsoever let all thy wants 
lie upon me ; only lodge not in the street. So he brought him into his 
house, and gave provender unto the asses : and they washed their feet, and 
did eat and drink." 

Now came the terrible catastrophe. Men of the city, 
actuated by the most hideous depravity, besieged the house, 
and demanded the stranger. To protect him, the host 
laid hold on the man's concubine and took her out to 
them, and, V\^hen the woman was delivered to them, with 
ribaldry and unnatural cruelty they dragged her out and 
subjected her to the basest uses. The result is told in a 
few words that can hardly have a parallel for simplicity. 

"Then came the woman in the dawning of the day, and fell down at the 
door of the man's house where her lord was, till it was light. And her lord 
rose up in the morning, and opened the doors of the house, and went out to 
go his way : and, behold, the woman his concubine was fallen down at the 
door of the house, and her hands were upon the threshold And he said 
unto her, Up, and let us be going. But none answered, 

" Then the man took her up upon an ass, and the man rose up, and gat 
him unto his place. And when he was come into his house, he took a knife, 
and laid hold on his concubine, and divided her, together with her bones, 
into twelve pieces, and sent her into all the coasts of Israel, 

"And it was so, that all that saw it said, There was no such deed done 
nor seen from the day that the children of Israel came up out of the land of 
Egypt unto this day : consider of it, take advice, and speak your minds." 

What a messenger and what a message to send to all the 
tribes around about ! 

" Then all the children of Israel went out, and the congregation was 
gathered together as one man, from Dan evew to Beer-sheba, with the land 
of Gilead, unto Jehovah in Mizpeh. And the chiefs of all the people, even 
of all the tribes of Israel, presented themselves in the assembly of the 



JEPHTHAIL ■ 2,97 

people of God, four hundred thousand footmen that drew sword. (Now 
the children of Benjamin heard that the children of Israel were gone up to 
Mizpeh.) 

" Then said the children of Israel, Tell us, how was this wickedness ? 
And the Levite, the husband of the woman that was slain, answered." 

And he gives the story in brief, as it has ah'eady been 
narrated. Then he said : — 

" Behold, ye are all children of Israel ; give here your advice and counsel. 
And all the people arose as one man, saying, We will not any of us go to 
his tent, neither will we any of us turn into his house. But now this shall 
be the thing which we will do to Gibeah ; we will go up by lot against it." 

Lots were cast, and there were taken ten men out of a 
hundred, a hundred out of a thousand, and a thousand out 
of ten thousand, and they went up against Gibeah, and they 
assaulted it, and took it, and put to the sword all the men, 
women, and children in it — eleven tribes against this one ; 
for when the tribe of Benjamin was told to deliver up the 
men that had done this wickedness, as a testimony of their 
horror, and to separate themselves from the guilt of this 
public crime, they refused. The tribal spirit ran high ; 
they stood up for their own kin, and they went willingly to 
battle, bringing out their whole armed forces ; for they 
were valiant men of war, and the eleven tribes had three 
successive days of obstinate fighting before subduing them. 
And it is said that, as a result, with the exception of about 
six hundred that shut themselves up in a cave, the Benjam- 
ites were all put to the sword, and the tribe was very nearly 
exterminated. 

Then came a kind of popular revulsion. This was a time 
of strange contrasts. The people, aroused to fury against 
Benjamin by a sense of the wrong that had been committed, 
had emptied their cities and villages, and gone up, a great 
multitude, to avenge this crime, and they had all but cut 
off the tribe, having slain all the women, all the children, 
and all the men except about six hundred. Then they 
withdrew, and went back to the ark and the tabernacle, 
and were seized with a feeling of horror at the thought, 
"A tribe is blotted out in Israel ! " That seemed to touch 



398 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the very pride of the nation, that but eleven tribes remained. 
Six hundred men only lived of the thousands and tens of 
thousands of the inhabitants of Benjamin ; and there could 
be no households among them, for the people of Israel had 
sworn by a solemn oath unto the Lord that they would not 
allow one of their daughters to marry into that tribe. So 
there was mourning, and they said, " They have no wives, 
and although these six hundred remain there will be no 
posterity, and the tribe will be extinct." 

But they fell upon a device which was peculiar to that 
age. They called for the record, and made an examination 
to see if all the people had come up upon the summons, 
and they found that none from Jabesh-gilead had come to 
the fight ; and therefore they walked over to Jabesh-gilead, 
and killed all the men and all the married women, and 
spared the young women, of whom there were four hun- 
dred, and called peaceably upon the six hundred children of 
Benjamin to come out from their hiding places, and all but 
two hundred of them had waives provided for them through 
this courting by the sword. Two hundred more w^ere 
needed : but the Israelites had vowed that they would not 
allow any of their children to be married into that tribe ; 
and so they whispered to the Benjamites who had no wives 
that at Shiloh there were certain religious festivals and 
dances going on, and that if they would rush in and catch 
and run off with tw^o hundred more virgins the parents 
should be argued with and placated, so that no harm should 
come of it. Thus, having taken four hundred maidens by 
the sword, and having stolen two hundred more, the Israel- 
ites fitted out the six hundred Benjamites with wives, and 
preserved the integrity of that tribe. 

That is the second history. What a time ! What a state 
of society ! And these were " the people of God." They 
were a people that arrogated to themselves superiority. 
They were the people that had for hundreds and hundreds 
of years borne testimony that they were the peculiar people 
of God. And yet, in no age, and by no nation, were there 
ever performed more barbarous deeds than during three or 



JEPHTHAH. 399 

four hundred years were performed in the history of this 
people. 

Now, if we believe that God develops mankind by his 
divine providence, according to a method of evolution 
under natural law, we can bridge over this terrible gulf ; 
but if we suppose that all this time these people were 
under the speciaL guardianship and immediate direction of 
God, what are you going to do with these four hundred 
hideous years of darkness ? And those parallel four hun- 
dred dreadful years in Egypt — what are you going to do 
with them ? Along the line of the thought that the-re is a 
providence which works through natural law among the 
nations by a process of the unfolding of germinant moral 
sense, and tends toward civilization, morality, and spiritu- 
ality, I can get relief ; but along the other line I can get 
none. 

In following these episodes, I have not always taken 
them in the order of their occurrence in the record, but 
rather have grouped them according to the chief elements 
they manifest. Our readings to-night have shown the 
power of superstition on rude natures and the readiness 
with which men find religious sanction for the devices and 
desires of their own hearts. The third of the three stories 
mentioned this evening as concluding our study of the 
time of the Judges is that of Samson, which we will con- 
sider next Sunday evening. 



XXII. 

SAMSON. 



To-night, we deal with the last history that we shall con- 
sider in the book of Judges — the history of Samson. 

I cannot afford to follow the example of spiritualizers 
who think it necessary or profitable to dress out the char- 
acters of antiquity with all the qualities which it would be 
possible for them to have if they lived in our time. It is 
true that now and then every age produces singular indi- 
viduals that are well balanced, eminent in moral directions, 
intellectual and esthetic ; but they are rare. For the most 
part, men who, having lived in the early ages, are reputed 
to have been great moral men, were rude and deficient to 
a degree that oftentimes woiild have made them not simply 
culpable but criminal if they had lived in our age. Yet, in 
their own age, either they were so useful in certain lines, 
or else they had singular qualities which were so eminent, 
that they are put in the calendar, I will not say of the 
saints, but of the heroes. Thus 3^ou will find in the eleventh 
chapter of Hebrews — a picture gallery of history — the 
names of Jephthah, of Samson, and of the harlot Rahab, as 
belonging to the list of persons eminent in the Israelitish 
history, who through faith in the invisible God of the 
Jews wrought wonders in times of personal and national 
tribulation. 

Of the harlot Rahab we know nothing, except her kind- 
ness to the spies because from the history of the Hebrews 
she believed in their God, and helped them. Certainly 
her general character would no't entitle her to have a name 
among the saints. Jephthah, a Bedouin Arab, was a free- 



Sunday evening, April 27, 1S79, Lesson : Psa. cxxxv. 



SAAISOAT. 401 

booter, acting in accordance with the law of the strongest ; 
but in one pre-eminent period of his life, inspired with 
patriotic valor in the name of his national God, he did 
great good to his people, rescuing them and then ruling 
'them during the space of six years. Samson possessed 
traits which made him a conspicuous figure in the time in 
which he lived, and he was most useful to his own people • 
but he was no more a saint than Hercules was, or Goliath ; 
and I cannot afford to invest him with a spiritual halo. 
In other words, I cannot consistently invest him with qual- 
ities that are utterly at variance with those that belonged 
to his nature. 

There is much exaggeration in the usual treatment of all 
these characters, and even of so great a man of God as the 
prophet Samuel. It is amusing to read the pious things 
that are written of him. It is almost as good as a play. It 
is absolutely grotesque. It is absurd in the highest degree, 
to one who has a sense of humor. 

I cannot deal so with Bible characters. I cannot under- 
take to make you believe that because a man figures in 
Old Testament history he was better than he would be if 
measured by canons of morality such as have been dis- 
closed in this later time. We must judge greenness by 
ripeness ; and it is the ethical clarity of the New Testa- 
ment by which we must judge the sordid nature of men 
even in the very twilight dawn of human life. To be sure, 
we do not blame men for living low in those early ages as 
we should blame them if they were living thus now ; but 
in describing them as heroes, and still more in speaking of 
them as prophets, we must measure their deficiencies by 
the ethics of the New Testament, and not attempt to spirit- 
ualize and slur over their faults, and undertake to show 
that when they did things criminal it was because God 
told them to. It will not answer to argue that it was right 
for this and that man in antiquity to steal, or murder, or 
commit acts of cruelty, because God commanded them to 
do these things. An influence that makes a man brutal 

may be inspiration, but it is not inspiration from above. 
26 



402 BIBLE STUDIES. 

Now, while I delineate some of the peculiarities of the 
character of Samson you must bear with me if I analyze it, 
and give the facts as they are, and not as our Sunday- 
school classes have often been taught to think them to be. 

There is a charming chapter, if you will make suitable 
allowance for the imperfections of the age to which it 
refers, the thirteenth of Judges, that opens with a simple 
history of the parents of Samson — Manoah and his wife. 
She had no name. In that age a woman had none of any 
consequence. Women may have had names, but it was 
generally unnecessary to record them. Therefore, "a cer- 
tain woman " is often spoken of. As nowadays, in the 
theory of the law, a w^oman lapses and merges into her 
husband, and is known only as included in her husband, 
so in antiquity woman had little or no identity of her own. 
Manoah and his wife, therefore, figured together with one 
name between them. 

It seems that this woman had a vision of angels, and it 
w^as repeated in dreams, concerning the birth of a child, 
which in those days, as in all times, was thought to be a 
blessing from the hand of God. The promise of children 
is divine, and to every noble nature the thought of bring- 
ing a child into life should be like a visit and vision of 
angels from God's very throne. It is the dearest, the 
divinest, the deepest, and the purest experience of human 
life. 

The ministration of angels was not, however, in this case, 
so much to declare the coming birth as to declare that the 
child was to be a hero, and that it must be brought up 
with that thought in view. But is not every child a subject 
of angelic visitation ? Every mother's babe is perhaps 
capable of becoming a hero ; yet it is not every mother 
that brings her child up as if he were so. 

So the father and mother were commanded to rear their 
child as a Nazarite, a word implying the primitive or un- 
developed form of monk. It comes nearer to the monastic 
institution than anything else recorded in the Bible, of the 
history of this early period. It is true that monasticism, 



SAMSChV. 403 

for the most part, gave men a local habitation, a seclusion 
from the family estate, not only, but from the civil occu- 
pations of life, shutting them up in a home provided ex- 
pressly for them ; but among the Hebrews, a Nazarite, 
although he separated himself from people in some respects, 
still commingled with them in other respects, and lived 
the ordinary life. As in the case of Samuel, Samson was 
brought up to separate himself from people by his habits 
of life. He was forbidden to taste the fruit of the vine. 
He was to be a teetotaler ; and he grew up to great strength 
without a knowledge of stimulants as they were known in 
his nation and age. 

More than that, he made himself peculiar by refusing to 
cut his hair. Undoubtedly he was a man of large stature, 
brawny, gigantic of bone and muscle, and with locks 
allowed to grow in full. The animal in him was mighty. 
His hair was unshorn and untrimmed. He was, however, 
in disposition not an ascetic ; he was a jovial man. This 
was never with the hilarity of intoxicating drink ; his 
joviality was the natural outflow of his own nature. 

He is, indeed, almost the only man of the Old Testament 
the keynote of whose life seems to have been sportiveness 
or mirthfulness. Strange as it may seem, nearly every 
one of the delineations of Samson's character carries with 
it an element of almost irresistible jollity or humor. Al- 
though his various transactions were very rude and harsh, 
I think it will be found when we come to examine him 
from the standpoint of his own thought, that he had in 
him a kind of mirthful craft and cunning, and that he saw 
the great fun of things as well as the element of success 
that was in them. 

Chapter thirteen closes with these words : — 

"And the woman bare a son, and called his name Samson : and the child 
grew, and Jehovah blessed him. And the spirit of Jehovah began to move 
him at times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol." 

Here, probably, is the history of twenty-five years com- 
pressed into two short verses. What are we to understand 
by these words ? Looking at such a statement as this in 



404 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the light of the facts of human life, of observation and 
experience, what may we conclude was the temperament 
he possessed ? 

There is a line that may be said to divide the whole 
human family of every nation. The few are above that 
line, and the vast multitude are below it. It is the line of 
power, inspiration, and exaltation. There is in the human 
constitution a capacity of sudden, powerful, concentrated 
thought or feeling. It may take on any one of several 
forms. A great many men are kindled slowly as green 
wood is. Other men are kindled fast, as dry wood is. 
Some, however, are capable of going off like gunpowder, 
suddenly, with intensity, at a word or at a thought, unbe- 
known to themselves and apparently uninvoked ; there is 
that which pours the whole tide of their being out in one 
flame. This is the power of being what men call '' inspired." 
The ancients considered it an act by which a god entered 
into a man and took possession of him, inspiring or breath- 
ing his own spirit into him. The best reason they could 
give for this sudden exaltation in a man was that he had a 
god in him that lifted him and carried him upward. He 
was godlike, according to their conception, so different was 
he from common men. 

This condition depends upon the structure of the mind. 
It requires that a man should have a certain quality — fine- 
ness or susceptibility of nerve. More than that, it is not 
an effect without a cause ; it is the result of a given com- 
bination of forces. And among these is the physical instru- 
mentality of a sudden influx of blood upon the brain. But 
the current that comes to the brain should be stimulating. 
That is, the blood should be rich and full of power. And, 
moreover, the veins and arteries of the brain must act so 
that it can not only receive a sudden influx of power for 
instantaneous use, but can relieve itself with great freedom, 
or else there is danger of congestion and stupidity, caused 
by the throwing into it the whole force of circulation. The 
brain should be able to free itself easily, and with spon- 
taneity, by a ready utilization — physical or mental or 



saj/soa: 405 

both — of any such excess of power that may be thrown 
upon it by the whole force that inheres in the man, whether 
that be greater or less. 

Now, this susceptibility to inspiration is a matter of en- 
dowment at birth. No man by thinking can add one 
cubit to. his stature ; and no man by thinking can change 
his brain so that its structure shall not be what it was ; nor 
can he change the construction of his organized body. 

The old Roman writers used to say that a poet was 
born, not made. Education may enable a man to make 
rhymes, but not to w^rite poetry. And thus, men that are 
capable of being inspired are so by nature. It is said of 
Jeremiah that he was called to be a prophet from his 
mother's womb. We should say in modern phrase that he 
had original adaptations to the prophetic function. And 
where a man has that inspirational force, that automatic 
action of mind, that sudden rushing energy which clothes 
him as in an instant with unusual power, it is born in him. 
It is never educated into a man. One having the elements 
of it may b}^ education develop it, and make it more usable, 
or regulate it ; but the fundamental conditions of it belong 
to the man's constitution. 

This quality was not confined to the holy men of old, as 
they are called. In the time of the Israelites it broke out 
in every nation. Men that had this inspirational power 
were supposed to be channels through which the gods 
communicated. They were the men that governed the 
oracles. They were the Oriental leaders. If a man came 
into such a condition that he showed intense excitement he 
was thought to be possessed of a god. In some nations, 
even such persons as lunatics were considered sacred, and 
to harm them in any wise was like striking a god. 

Where this sensibility of the whole cerebral system 
acted upon the physical frame, it made a man a warrior — 
not a w^arrior in the modern sense of being able to lay out 
and conduct large campaigns, but a warrior in battle, 
where inspiration enables one man to fire a thousand by 
his heroism, and lead them into the field as the lightning 



4o6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

comes when once the cloud gives it out. Where it acted 
in the direction of the intellectual, it made men's reason 
powerful mainly in persuasion or demonstration. Where 
it acted in the direction of the imagination, it made them 
poets and orators. V/here it acted with the moral senti- 
ments as well as with the imagination, it made them 
prophets and preachers. 

In Samson it was the lowest form. He was not a 
prophet, nor a preacher, nor a poet, nor a thinker. You 
might pluck his life bare from end to end and you could 
not find in it anything worth remembering of thought or 
feeling. He was utterly devoid of the higher forms of 
mental productiveness. And yet, Samson was a great man 
in his way. He was a genius of muscle. More than that, 
he was a genius of patriotism. There are four gradations 
in this direction. The first stage is where a man naturally 
loves himself ; that is savagism. The second stage is where 
a man loves his tribe ; tribal love is much higher than 
self-love. In the exercise of that love he begins to develop 
the generous sentiments of self-sacrifice. But a man is low 
down that has no enthusiasm except for himself and for 
his own tribe or family. The third stage is that of patriot- 
ism, where a man loves his nation ; and that is a very 
great advance over the first and second stages, and carries 
with it signal benefits which they do not yield. But there 
is a stage which is higher than that, and which implies 
such a development of the moral and intellectual elements 
in a man that he comes into sympathy with the declara- 
tion of our Saviour that to him "the field is the world." 
This is the very highest point of development that is possi- 
ble to the human race. 

Samson stood, a great rude man, on the third plane. 
He loved himself, he loved his own household and friends, 
evidently, and he was so much a loving man that he loved 
his own people ; but he did not love mankind. 

As this man is described he is an instance of the great 
distinction which exists between Eastern and Western 
manners, and between the conceptions of the religious life 



SAMS ox. 407 

as they exist in the East and in the West. He was a Jewish 
chief nearly resembling the founder of a monastic order. 
The founder of a monastic institution in medieval or mod- 
ern times would be usually a man that denied himself of 
pleasure — who lived an ascetic life — utterly devoid of the 
ordinary passions and ambitions of men. Samson, who 
was an eminent example of the monastic order in antiq- 
uity, was very social, very genial, and very frolicsome, and 
anything but a model of propriety. 

The first scene we have in which he figures is that of his 
courtship. You may wonder why this should be inserted 
in the Bible, when there were so many other things which 
men were dying for the lack of, that were left out ; but so 
it is. Although it may be a stumbling-block in certain 
points of view, in other points of view it is of profound 
interest, as presenting a history of the manners of the 
times in which Samson lived. 

"And Samson went down to Timnath, and saw a woman in Timnath of 
the daughters of the Philistines. And he came up, and told his father and 
his mother, and said, I have seen a woman in Timnath of the daughters of 
the Philistines : now therefore get her for me to wife." 

In those days and lands, you know, wives were bought 
and sold like cattle. They are still, only it is done in a 
far more gracious manner than it used to be. The interior 
of the transaction is yet to a very great extent a mere 
matter of barter, but in the time of Samson it was exterior 
and obvious. Then, the father owned his children. Their 
life was in his hands. Their property was his, not alone in 
Israel but even so late as in Rome. 

In this case Samson asks his father and mother to go 
and buy this girl for him. He liked her ; but they didn't, 
— as is very often the fact. 

" Then his father and his mother said unto him, Is there never a woman 
among the daughters of thy brethren, or among all my people, that thou 
goest to take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines ? " 

They were right, as the sequel proved. To be sure, in 
the enthusiasm of young love, in the inexperienced glow of 
undisciplined affections, the young are apt to despise th^ 



4o8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

counsel of father and mother, and to follow their own 
inclinations instead of considerations of fitness, adaptation, 
and propriety. If it were true that the enthusiasm of 
early love would bake bread, and make clothes, and till 
fields, and build houses, and promote family welfare in life, 
there would be more excuse for implicitly obeying its dic- 
tates. But it is not true. Still, I would not underrate it. 
I pity a man that never has had it. It may not be his 
fault. It is not the fault of a stick of wood that it cannot 
play a tune — but its misfortune. I cannot conceive that 
man to have the highest manhood who does not know 
how to be crazy, on proper occasions, with an enthusiasm 
which lifts him above calculation, above sordid motives. 
There is an inspiration of the inner, better, higher life 
under which such a thing is perfectly safe ; but in this 
lower life, environed with matter and material conditions, 
while there ought, surely, not to be less enthusiasm and 
disinterested love, there ought somewhere to be prudence. 
Generally speaking, the right place for the prudence is in 
father and mother ; and young people would do well to 
take heed to their counsels, as Samson did not. He got 
his pay for disregarding their advice, as we shall see. 

" His father and his mother knew not that it was of Jehovah, that he 
sought an occasion against the Philistines : for at that time the Philistines 
had dominion over Israel. Then went Samson down, and his father and 
his mother, to Timnath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath." 

They did not travel together ; for the scene with the 
lion took place when he was alone. 

"And, behold, a young lion roared against him. And the spirit of 
Jehovah came mightily upon him, and he rent him as he would have rent 
a kid, and he had nothing in his hand : but he told not his father or his 
mother what he had done." 

Samson evidently was no boaster. It has seemed strange 
to you and to me that a man should attack a lion and kill 
him with nothing in his hand ; but that is owing to the dif- 
ference between you and me and Samson. If you suppose 
that which is recorded of him to be impossible, you are 
l?:jistaken. It is recorded of not a few, and is not confined 



SAA/SO.V. 409 

to sacred histor3^ It will bring to mind the reply of David 
when he offered to go out against Goliath, and Saul told 
him he was a stripling too young to undertake so formid- 
able a task. Said he : — 

" Thy servant kept his father's sheep, and there came a lion, and a bear, 
and took a lamb out of the flock : and I went out after him, and smote him, 
and delivered it out of his mouth : and when he arose against me, I caught 
him by his beard, and smote him, and slew him. Thy servant slew both the 
lion and the bear." 

There have been valiant men besides Baron Munchausen 
who have distinguished themselves by seizing wild beasts 
by the tongue or jaw and rending them asunder ; and if 
others had done it there is no reason why we should not 
believe that Samson did it. Great things had been proph- 
esied of him as a deliverer of his people ; he had been 
trained in the idea ; he felt his own strength ; he believed 
in it as the gift of God, — and the inspiration that seized 
him was the flaming cojisciousness of victorious power. 

"And he went down, and talked with the woman ; and she pleased Sam- 
son well." 

This seems to have been the second visit. 

"After a time he returned to take her." 

There is no further account given of the parental coun- 
sel ; at any rate, they seem to have acquiesced. On his 
way, — 

" He turned aside to see the carcass of the lion [the flesh had evidently 
decayed, leaving the ribs and other portions of the frame complete] ; and, 
behold, there was a swarm of bees and honey in the carcass of the lion. 
And he took thereof in his hands, and went on eating, and came to his 
father and mother, and he gave them, and they did eat : but he told not 
them that he had taken the honey out of the carcass of the lion. 

"And his father went down unto the woman : and Samson made there a 
feast." 

It was his wedding feast. And now his sense of humor 
begins to appear. 

" It came to pass, when they saw him, that they brought thirty compan- 
ions to be with him. And Samson said unto them [the Philistines], I will 
now put forth a riddle unto you." 

The propounding and guessing of riddles was one of the 



4to BIBLE STUDIES. 

common occupations of Oriental nations, clear down to the 
last days of the Israelites. They were not exactly conun- 
drums, but questions that tested the ingenuity ; and prob- 
ably it was as good as many of the occupations that are 
pursued now^adays. 

'•' If ye can certainly declare it me within the seven days of the feast, and 
find it out, then I will give you thirty sheets and thirty change of garments ; 
but if ye cannot declare it me, then shall ye give me thirty sheets and thirty 
change of garments." 

That is, he gave a riddle, and bet thirty sheets and thirty 
robes that they could not guess it, and they bet thirty 
sheets and thirty robes that they could. It was gambling, 
though it is described in decorous language ; but a great 
deal of gambling goes on under pious phrases. 

"And they said unto him. Put forth thy riddle, that we may hear it. And 
he said unto them. Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong 
came forth sweetness." 

I confess I should have been puzzled if that riddle had 
been put to me. I could not for the life of me have told 
what it meant. Apparently it might have related to any 
of a thousand things ; but it was all the better for that. 

" They could not in three days expound the riddle. And it came to pass 
on the seventh day, that they said unto Samson's wife, Entice thy husband, 
that he may declare unto us the riddle." 

She was evidently a weak woman, who rather meant to 
do right, or who did not go to do wrong of her own accord. 
At any rate, this betrayal of her husband's interests would 
hardly seem to have been a proper proceeding at so early 
a period after one's wedding. She hesitated, probably ; 
and, as she did so, they added : — 

" Lest we burn thee and thy father's house with fire : have ye called us 
to take that we have ? Is it not so ? " 

They wanted her to get Samson to tell her, and they 
wanted her then to tell them ; and, when she hesitated, they 
charged her with having invited them to this feast for the 
purpose of robbing them, and threatened to take revenge by 
destroying her and her father's house if she did not com- 



saji/soa: 4ri 

ply with their request. She addressed to her husband the 
universal argument : — 

" Samson's wife wept before him, and said : " — 

What did she say ? O, nothing new. There is nothing 
new under the sun. You will find that four thousand 
years ago human nature ran in the same channels that it 
does now. We are all going over and over again the old 
things. 

" Samson's wife wept before him, and said. Thou dost but hate me, and 
lovest me not : thou hast put forth a riddle unto the children of my people, 
and hast not told it me. And he said unto her, Behold, I have not told it 
my father nor my mother, and shall I tell it thee ? And she wept before 
him the seven days, while their feast lasted." 

A very pleasant wedding festival they must have had ; 
but continual dropping will wear away a stone. 

"And it came to pass on the seventh day, that he told her, because she 
lay sore upon him." 

A woman is just as weak as a child ; a man could take 
her with two fingers and put her out of the door ; and yet 
in a week a woman can weary a man into almost anything. 

"And she told the riddle to the children of her people. And the men of 
the city said unto him on the seventh day before the sun went down, What 
is sw-eeter than honey ? and what is stronger than a lion ? 

"And he said unto them, If ye had not ploughed with my heifer, ye had 
not found out my riddle." 

Now, there was business ! 

"And the spirit of Jehovah came upon him [that is, in his indignation, 
tremendous power and courage rose up in him], and he went down to 
Ashkelon, and slew thirty men of them, and took their spoil, and gave 
change of garments unto them which expounded the riddle." 

They won the bet, and they got the clothes ; but who 
lost them ? It was a very easy way of paying one's gam- 
bling debt. 

"And his anger was kindled [That did not slake it. His indignation was 
like the sea, whose waves, even after the wind goes down, roll sometimes 
for days], and he went up to his father's house." 

He abandoned the wife for the time being. He could 
not stand living with her ; and, as it will appear, he could 



412 BIBLE STUDIES. 

not stand living without her. Such is the history of thou- 
sands of men. 

" But Samson's wife was given to his companion, whom he had used as 
his friend." 

That was one of the band of thirty that had been invited 
to the house. Evidently Samson was partial to him, and 
he probably took Samson's place. There were no divorce 
proceedings ; and it did not take long for the father who 
had given the damsel to one man, to give her, after he had 
gone off, to another. There w^as no law and no moral sen- 
timent to prevent this. 

" But it came to pass within a while after [you see how definite the state- 
ment is as to time], in the time of wheat harvest, that Samson visited his 
wife with a kid ; and he said, I will go in to my wife into the chamber. 
But her father would not suffer him to go in. And her father said, I verily 
thought that thou hadst utterly hated her ; therefore I gave her to thy com- 
panion : is not her younger sister fairer than she 1 Take her, I pray thee, 
instead of her." 

When a man's heart is fixed upon a certain woman, she 
and she only will satisfy him. Others may be fairer and 
more suitable, but after all the secret intoxication is upon 
him and he will accept no substitute. 

"And Samson said concerning them, Now shall I be more blameless than 
the Philistines, though I do them a displeasure * And Samson went and 
caught three hundred foxes [Here, too, there is the utter absence of any 
record of time. There is no telling how long it took him to catch them], 
and took firebrands, and turned tail to tail, and put a firebrand in the midst 
between two tails. And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go 
into the standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and 
also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives." 

This, too, has been a stumbling-block of wonder to a 
great many people. But, in the first place, we are to 
remember that in that hilly country animals, including 
foxes, were very numerous, that oftentimes they were 
found in flocks, and that they might have been gathered 
together and caught by driving them into corrals or pre- 
pared places. At any rate it was not a thing so impossible 



*"This time shall I be quits with the Philistines, when I do them a mis- 
chief." Bcv. Vers. mars[iii. 



SAJ/SOA\ 413 

but that one ma}" believe it. Then as to tying firebrands 
between their tails after they were caught, that was not so 
difficult a matter. The reason why Samson tied the foxes 
together as he did was that if they had been allowed to go 
separately, they would have run away quickly and done 
little damage, but that being tied together they would 
attempt to run in different directions, and would be delayed 
so that the brands would have time to catch the dry straw, 
and insure the destruction of the whole crop. 

Now you are to understand that this took place, not 
over a great extent of country, but only in the neighborhood 
of the thirty Philistines that got the sheets and robes ; and 
if it still taxes your credulity, it is to be added that this is 
not a novel thing. It is recorded of Hannibal, you will 
recollect, that under certain circumstances he tied brands 
to the horns of two thousand oxen, and sent them out for 
devastation. The Romans, in festivals, were accustomed 
to tie brands to foxes and set them loose, as a kind of cere- 
mony. We have accounts of tying brands to bullocks' 
tails, and watching their course to determine whether or 
not the gods were propitious. When you come to look 
into the customs which were prevalent as far down as the 
time when Rome was in her glory, the strangeness of this 
event to your mind will be somewhat alleviated. 

** Then the Philistines said, Who hath done this ? And they answered, 
Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he had taken his wife, and 
given her to his companion. And the Philistines came up, and burnt her 
and her father with fire." 

That was a quick remedy. It was administered not 
simply in a spirit of wrath, but also with a desire to leave 
nothing to tempt Samson into that neighborhood there- 
after. 

"And Samson said unto them, Though ye have done this, yet will I be 
avenged of you, and after that I will cease." 

In other words, " You have had your turn ; now I will 
have mine : and the thing shall be ended." 

"And he smote them hip and thigh with a great slaughter : and he went 
down and dwelt in the top of the rock Etam." 



414 BIBLE STUDIES. 

What unmannerly times ! What a strange condition of 
human society ! 

" Then the Philistines went up, and pitched in Judah [for Israel at this 
time was under the dominion of the Philistines], and spread themselves in 
Lehi. And the men of Judah said, Why are ye come up against us ? " 

This evidently was a neighborhood matter. It was not 
known by the Israelites at large. The}^ did not under- 
stand the reason of the invasion. 

" They answered, To bind Samson are we come up, to do to him as he 
hath done to us. 

" Then three thousand men of Judah went to the top of the rock Etam, 
and said to Samson, Knowest thou not that the Philistines are rulers over 
us ? What is this that thou hast done unto us ? And he said unto them, 
As they did unto me, so have I done unto them. And they said unto him, 
We are come down to bind thee, that we may deliver thee into the hand of 
the Philistines. And Samson said unto them, Swear unto me, that ye will 
not fall upon me yourselves. And they spake unto him, saying. No ; but 
we will bind thee fast, and deliver thee into their hand : but surely we will 
not kill thee. And they bound him with two new cords, and brought him 
up from the rock." 

I can imagine this great rollicking giant of a Samson 
sitting on the sides of the hills and grimly laughing while 
the foxes tugged at each other's tails with firebrands tied 
to them through the fields ; there was something humor- 
ous in it to every man — except the one who owned the 
fields : and I can imagine how, when the three thousand 
Israelites came and told him that they had come to bind 
him and deliver him to his enemies, this hirsute, powerful 
man inwardly chuckled and put his hands up, and allowed 
them to tie him. Doubtless he really enjoyed being tied, 
knowing very well, as he did, what was in him. 

"And when he came unto Lehi, the Philistines shouted against him: and 
the spirit of Jehovah came mightily upon him, and the cords that were upon 
his arms became as flax that was burnt with fire, and his bands loosed from 
off his hands. 

"And he found a new jawbone of an ass, and put forth his hand, and took 
it, and slew a thousand men therewith. And Samson said, With the jaw- 
bone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a 
thousand men." 

This, too, has been thought to be very wonderful ; and 
it would be, for you or me. It was a ncni jawbone, with 



SAJ/SO.V. 413 

the juices of life not dried out of it ; and you will remember 
that, being the jawbone of an ass, it was very tough, and 
no mean weapon. As to the slaughter, it was not a diffi- 
cult thing, under the circumstances, for him to kill so many 
men. He ran at them roaring and smiting ; and they were 
infected with panic, while he was actuated by enthusiastic 
courage. I quite believe the account. 

Moreover, it was not the most active jawbone of an ass 
that ever was. Others have been as fatal in different ways 
and in different scenes ! 

"And he was sore athirst, and called on Jehovah, and said, Thou hast 
given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant : and now shall I 
die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised ? But God clave 
an hollow place that was in the jaw,* and there came water thereout ; and 
when he had drunk, his spirit came again, and he revived : wherefore he 
called the name thereof En-hakkore, which is in Lehi unto this day. 

"And he judged Israel in the days of the Philistines twenty years." 

Here you come to a more favorable aspect. Having de- 
livered the people, the sense of power and of patriotism 
seems to have given him the best use of his judgment. 
They made their champion their ruler, and he judged and 
protected them for twenty years. His was a good nature. 
He was a kindly man. He was not a man of moderate 
passions ; he would have been marked in our day as a man 
grossly immoral : but he was a lover of his kin and of his 
country. He therefore had pre-eminent qualities for ruling 
in such a rude time as that in which he lived. 

According to the account which is given of this man in 
later life, in the pursuit of illicit pleasures he found him- 
self entrapped in the city of Gaza. As the people knew 
that he was there, they closed the gates, and determined, 
with the light of the morning, to secure him. " But he 
arose at midnight," it is recorded, ''and took the doors of 
the gate of the city, and the two posts, and w^ent away 
with them, bar and all, and put them upon his shoulders, 
and carried them up to the top of a hill that is before 
Hebron." How he must ha^fe enjoyed that — walking off 



*"The hollow place that is in Lehi." /^ev. Vers, margiti. 



41 6 BIBLE STUDIES. 

with the very instruments of his captivity ! If these gates 
were like the gates of some fortified cities of our time, they 
would weigh some forty thousand or fifty thousand pounds, 
and the tax on our credulity would be too heavy ; but when 
we consider how the gates of cities or cam.ps were built 
at that time, it is not difficult for us to believe this story. 
The gates spoken of here may have been such that it was 
quite within the power of so gigantic a man as Samson to 
carry them. There is nothing in the statement that need 
prevent our belief of it. 

The next record of this man is not a very reputable one. 

"And it came to pass afterwards, that he loved a woman in the valley of 
Sorek, whose name was Delilah." 

Then comes the history of her enticinghim. It is intensely 
natural, it is intensely human, and it is intensely miserable. 
He was now a public man, a magistrate, and he knew 
better. She, at the instigation of her people, the Philis- 
tines, persuaded him to declare wherein his strength lay. 
There are very few dramas written that, with so few simple 
touches, give so much interior history of the wiles of a 
cozening woman as does this of Delilah persuading Sam- 
son ; of his making believe this, that, and the other thing ; 
and of his finally, when wearied out by her importunities, 
telling her his secret. It is familiar. I need not detail all 
the ways in which he fooled her and her friends, nor the 
final way in which she induced him to fool himself. 

" He told her all his heart, and said unto her, There hath not come a 
razor upon mine head ; for I have been a Nazarite unto God from my 
mother's womb: if I be shaven, then my strength will go from me, and I 
shall become weak, and be like any other man. 

"And when Delilah saw that he had told her all his heart, she sent and 
called for the lords of the Philistines, saying, Come up this once [She 
had called them twice before, but only to be laughed at by the jolly giant], 
for he hath shewed me all his heart. Then the lords of the Philistines came 
up unto her, and brought money in their hand." 

Beautiful, cruel, worthless ;»rottener than the rot under 
the feet of the man that treads upon the fallen fruit of the 
orchard ! Pretending to love him, giving herself to him 



SAMSOiV. 417 

in sacrilege of love, betraying him that really loved her, 
— and for money ! 

"And she made him sleep upon her knees ; and she called for a man, and 
she caused him to shave off the seven locks of his head ; and she began to 
^ifflict him, and his strength went from him. And she said, The Philistines 
be upon thee, Samson. And he awoke out of his sleep, and said, I will go 
out as at other times before, and shake myself. And he wist not that 
Jehovah was departed from him. 

"But the Philistines took him, and put out his eyes, and brought him 
down to Gaza, and bound him with fetters of brass ; and he did grind in the 
prison house." 

Grinding was the most menial of offices in that land at 
that time ; and this bereft, forlorn, coarse-grained man was 
reduced to the pitiful plight of public servitude of the most 
degrading character. 

The account goes on to say that little by little Samson's 
hair grew again, and that with it came back his strength, 
his courage, his confidence, and his aptitude. Whether or 
not the long hair was the real secret of his enormous 
strength, it is clear that his belief in it was an essential 
element of his courage. And now he began to regain con- 
fidence. While yet i<n prison, he was brought out upon a 
great occasion to make sport for the Philistines, — probably 
in feats of strength. And he asked the lad who led him 
out to let him feel the columns which mainly supported 
the circular roof of the building in which the assembly was 
gathered, that he might rest, after his labors. When this 
request w^as granted, he uttered a cry to God, and then, 
exerting his immense strength, taking hold of the columns 
with his two hands, he bowed himself forward and wrenched 
the columns from their positions ; and the roof, crowded 
with people, came down with a crash into the space below, 
and hundreds upon hundreds were destroyed, as well as 
Samson himself. He was sacrificed by his own act, to- 
gether with thousands of his enemies — " men and women, 
and all the lords of the Philistines." 

Now, looking upon this history at large, what is there in 
it that should have given it a place in the records of Scrip- 
ture ? This : that it is a fact ; that it is a characteristic 
27 



41 8 BIBLE STUDIES. 

fact ; that it is a revelation of the low state in which the 
best men of that time were living. And that is not all. It 
shows that there are periods in the history of nations in 
which a rude strength may be better than intellectual 
genius. Moses was a transcendently better man than 
Samson ; he was one of the noblest men of all time ; ,and 
yet, when he thought himself called on to exert his strength, 
he slew the Egyptian, and turned and ran. He was not 
fit for deeds that required great physical energy ; but 
patience, wisdom, skill in organization, moral power — of 
these he had an ample endowment. In that later time, 
however, w^ithout a government, when every man did that 
which w^as right in his own sight, in a country without 
roads or institutions, there rose up this gigantic fellow, 
Samson, who brought fear to the hearts of the adversaries 
of his people ; and he was adapted to the rudeness, the 
coarseness, the vulgarity of his time. It is often the case 
that a man who is not himself remarkable for goodness 
is in many respects better qualified for taking care of bad 
men than another man that is wholly good. I speak with- 
out disrespect, and with the utmost sincerity, and in some 
respects with sympathy, when I say that though Thaddeus 
Stevens was not a man whose character should be taken as 
a model for young men to build on, yet, as the founder of the 
common-school system of Pennsylvania, he has an enduring 
fame ; and in national matters, at a time when men were 
treacherous, and w^hen what we wanted was a man who 
dared to venture all for the land that he loved, to take a 
stalwart stand for freedom and against slavery, he loomed 
up a grand figure. Not for everything, but just for that, 
he made his mark ; and his name will go down in history 
among the names of memorable men to whom the country 
is indebted. 

While, then, Samson was fitted to his age, to his nation, 
and to the work that was to be accomplished, and accord- 
ing to the standard of that age was honorable and respect- 
able, according to the standard of later times, and the con- 
ception of humanity which prevails to-day, he was one of 



SAJ/SOX. 419 

the poorest specimens that could be selected from antiquity. 
But how many men to-day, no better than he in respect to 
the things in which he was bad, are not as good as he in re- 
spect to the things in which he was good ! How many 
men are coarse, how many men are full of animal appe- 
tites, how many men are vindictive and cruel, how many 
men have no care for their families, still less for their coun- 
try, and no thought except for their own physical enjoy- 
ment, and yet think themselves to be good because they 
are no worse than they are ! 

In looking back upon the history of the period that is 
described in the book of Judges I have merely to say, in 
conclusion, that this book is one of the most remarkable 
of the Old Testament. The simplicity of it, the pictur- 
esqueness of it, the wonderful variety of its contents, the 
honesty of it, make it a book that can be read with profit. 
There are some things in it that go as deep, and some that 
go as high, as the productions of any of the dramatists of 
the English language. But, quite aside from its literary 
merit, it is a book of inspiration and revelation. It reveals 
a state of society from which the world has emerged, and 
on our escape from which we ought to look with gratitude. 

But we are not to suppose that the rude things recorded 
in it were the only things that were happening at the 
time to which it refers. During that very period of history 
were enacted scenes of beauty. Forth from it came strains 
of entrancing music. Upon the cheek of this rugged book 
of Judges lies the exquisite poem of Ruth. That charm- 
ing idyl would seem almost like the song of children and 
the voice of mothers ; it is pure, lovely, and in every way 
delightful. To that I shall call your attention next Sunday 
night. 



XXIII. 
NAOMI AND RUTH. 



A DIAMOND in its rough and ordinary state is not lus- 
trous nor beautiful ; nor is it so until it has been ground, 
and artificial facets and angles are raised upon it : but 
when it has gone through the processes of being cut and 
polished it is one of the loveliest of gems. The pearl, how- 
ever, suffers no hand to touch it. It is already perfect, and 
handling mars it. 

There are many doctrinal passages in the Bible that are 
obscure, and that need much exposition to discover the 
precious truth within them. There are some — and we have 
come upon one of them to-night — that w^ould be in danger 
of being dimmed and hurt if handled. 

This book of Ruth has but four chapters ; and yet, where 
can you find four other such chapters ? It is not for every- 
body, nor for anybody at all times, to read this book. You 
cannot prepare to read it with your dictionary and your 
commentary. There are some strains of poetry which a 
man can read only when, in the mutations of feeling, he 
comes around to the very point of feeling from which 
those poems came. A man in the heyday of joy and hilar- 
ity cannot read the " In Memoriam " of Tennyson. A man 
cast into profound grief cannot enter into some of the most 
exquisite poems of joy and fantasy. 

The book of Ruth should be read when the world has 
subsided from about us. You cannot read it nor under- 
stand it if 3^ou are cumbered with the habits of modern 
society, with our highly artificial conditions, with an utter 



Sunday evening, May 4, 1879. Lesson : Psa. xxiii. 



iVA OMI AND R UTIL 42 1 

difference of standpoint as to manners and customs. It 
runs far back into antiquity. Its scenes were cast not only 
in a remote age and in an Oriental nation, but in a time of 
society that was very simple in occupations, being not pas- 
toral, nor absolutely agricultural. Society had but little 
classification. Its life as well as its pursuits were very 
simple. No lordly dwellings were there for the rich, with 
hovels for the poor. Men lived very near to each other, 
both in locality and in condition. A little more land, a 
little more grain, a few more cattle, a few more robes, a 
little more gold or silver, differentiated the several classes ; 
but men lived near together, and upon a level. In this state 
of society, if we come into sympathy with it, there is un- 
folded that exquisite idyl of antiquity in which there is not 
a malicious person ; in which the Devil does not show so 
much as the top of his poll ; in which all coarse passions 
are subordinated ; in which the sweeter elements of life rise 
up and blossom. It is a garden of perfume from beginning 
to end, and it must be read in a spirit of reverence, and 
with a refined appreciation of natural virtues. That is what 
makes it so hard for me to do anything more than to read 
it — but I must do more. 

" Now it came to pass in the days when the Judges ruled, that there was 
a famine in the land." 

We have been wading through those times. We have 
had our hands full of the camp. We have marched with 
Moses and with Joshua. We have crossed the Jordan with 
them. We have gone into the seven years' war of dispos- 
session and of possession. We emerged from that heroic 
age. We came into the slough of the times of the Judges, 
when every man did that which was right in his own eyes. 
We have oscillated with the people, plunging into captiv- 
ity to paganism and the pagans, and then after many 
years coming forth under some natural leader that rose up 
and broke the chain, and led captivity captive. Our ears 
have been filled with the sounds of war — wars of wicked- 
ness and extermination ; and the smell of blood has become 
stenchful to us. We are tired of freebooters, and Jeph- 



422 BIBLE STUDIES. 

thahs, and Samsons. We have been in rough conflicts 
among a rude people in a cruel age. 

Finally, the uproar ceases, and 'we find ourselves in a 
beautiful valley, as it were, walled in with mountains, fruit- 
ful, abounding in green pastures and still waters. The 
people lived a lovely life, in which there was not one single 
discord, and not one cacophonous sound. 

Famines were common at that time, and are common in 
that land still, partly from want of skillful agriculture, and 
partly from climatic reasons. 

We have somewhat the parallel of these famines, in 
Southern California. No husbandman can control the 
wind-currents and the moisture ; and every five or seven 
years there comes a time when these currents and the 
moisture refuse to flow, and all summer long there is 
drought, drought, drought ; and the pastures fail, and the 
sheep die by thousands, and the large adventurers are 
bankrupt, — except as they have learned the moistening of 
the soil by culture and by irrigation. 

So it was in the hill country of Judah. 

" There was a famine in the land. And a certain man of Beth-lehem-judah 
[there were two Bethlehems — Beth-lehem-judah and Bethlehem] went to 
sojourn in the country of Moab, he, and his wife, and his two sons. And 
the name of the man was Elimelech \_El, in almost every case in which it is 
found in the Hebrew is equivalent to the ^nox6l god ; and Elimelech means 
??iy god, viy king. A very great name ; and a very good man he must have 
been that could carry such a name], and the name of his wife Naomi [which 
means pleasant, lovely, beautiful, not simply in the sense of comeliness, but in 
the sense of efflorescence of disposition. There is nothing in this world so 
beautiful as the shining forth of the soul of a woman], and the name of his 
two sons Mahlon and Chilion, Ephrathites of Beth-lehem-judah. 

"And they came into the country of Moab, and continued there. And 
Elimelech Naomi's husband died ; and she was left, and her two sons." 

To the east of the Dead Sea is the territory of Moab. 
Although the western side of it is mountainous, consisting 
of a high plateau, the further east you go the more is it 
streaked with fertile pasture valleys. These were appar- 
ently watered by the streams that flowed down from the 
hills. Into this country Elimelech had gone to escape 
from the famine of his own land. Commentators have 



NAOMI AXD RUTH. 423 

blamed him for going there. They have said that it was 
not for him to leave friends behind and come into a fat 
country himself. They have argued that he ought to have 
trusted God and stayed at home. As well might they 
have said that the Patriarchs ought never to have gone 
where they went. You might as well say that Jacob should 
not have sent his sons down to Egypt, but should have sat 
still and let the Lord deliver him, as to say that Elimelech 
should not have become an emigrant when he could find 
nothing to eat. If his neighbors and their families could 
not go, so much the worse for them. 

But soon after his arrival in Moab he died. And what 
did the two sons do ? 

" They took them wives of the women of Moab ; the name of the one 
was Orpah \the hind, or roe\ and the name of the other Ruth [Many have 
supposed that meant, in the original, the rose ; as you never can find out 
you may just as well call her Ruth] : and they dwelled there about ten years. 

"And Mahlon and Chilion died also, both of them ; and the woman was 
left of her two sons and her husband." 

The Moabitish women seem to have been very engaging 
and very beautiful. That was their reputation. There are 
nations nowadays that have the same reputation. It is 
said that Circassia, and some of the neighboring hill coun- 
tries, are famous for their beautiful daughters ; and Moab 
seems to have had that peculiarity. 

You will recollect that when Balaam was unable to make 
headway against Israel he counseled the Moabites to em- 
ploy their women in devilish diplomacy in order to draw 
the children of Israel aside and corrupt them, that they did 
so, and that thus was brought terrific punishment from the 
hand of Moses. But four or five hundred years had passed, 
and Moab had built up again the diminished population, 
and the same peculiarities of physique seem to have gone 
on. Blood tells. 

Mahlon and Chilion had married two of the daughters 
of Moab. They doubtless were beautiful. They certainly 
were good. This shows that although the Moabites were 
a vagrant nation all was not darkness in their midst. Their 



424 BIBLE STUDIES. 

life was not wholly corrupt. The household among them 
had its pure atmosphere and its virtuous lives. 

" Then she [Naomi, the pleasajit and comely] arose with her daughters-in- 
law, that she might return from the country of Moab : for she had heard in 
the country of Moab how that the Lord had visited his people in giving them 
bread. Wherefore she went forth out of the place where she was, and her 
two daughters-in-law with her ; and they went on the way to return unto the 
land of Judah." 

But as they journeyed the magnanimous heart of Naomi 
pondered ; she bethought her, and said, " Why, though I 
be a poor homeless widow, should I drag these my daugh- 
ters-in-law out from among their kindred and away from 
their fathers' homes ? Sweet, pleasant, they are to me ; 
but why should I take them to share my poverty and my 
wretchedness ? " So, with great generosity of heart she said 
to them, — 

" Go, return each to her mother's house : the Lord deal kindly with you, 
as ye have dealt with the dead, and with me." 

It was the voice of a wife whose husband was gone ; it 
was the voice of a mother whose sons were dead ; it was 
the voice of a widowed stranger. 

" The Lord grant [she said to them] that ye may find rest, each of you in 
the house of her husband. Then she kissed them ; and they lifted up their 
voice, and wept. 

"And they said unto her, Surely we will return with thee unto thy peo- 
ple. And Naomi said, Turn again, my daughters ; why will )^e go with 
me ? Are there yet any more sons in my womb, that they may be your hus- 
bands ? Turn again, my daughters, go your way ; for I am too old to have 
an husband. If I should sa}'^, I have hope, if I should have am husband also 
to-night, and should also bear sons ; would ye tarry for them till they were 
grown ? Would ye stay for them from having husbands .'' Nay, my daugh- 
ters ; for it grieveth me much for your sakes that the hand of the Lord is 
gone out against me. 

"Ai\(l they lifted up their voice, and wept again : and Orpah kissed her 
mother-in-law [that was the sign of farewell] ; but Ruth clave unto her." 

Orpah was sincere, she was true, she loved her mother- 
in-law, she clung to her : nevertheless, her heart was warm 
for her father's house, for the friends she had left behind, 
for the country of her nativity ; and, being in a strait 
betwixt two, and acting under the influence of a natural 



KAOMI AXD RUTH. 425 

generous affection, she went back and settled again in her 
father's household. 

But Ruth had more personal attachment, and she re- 
mained with their mother-in-law. 

' "And she [Naomi] said, Behold, thy sister-in-law is gone back unto her 
people, and unto her gods : return thou after thy sister-in-law. 

"And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from follow- 
ing after thee : for whither thou goest, I will go ; and where thou lodgest, 
I will lodge : thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. Where 
thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried ; the Lord do so to me, and 
more also, if aught but death part thee and me." 

If ever heart had tongue, and spoke the words of love, 
simple, pure, and deep, that was the utterance of it ; and 
it has passed into universal literature. It is diffused, 
throughout poetry. It has almost become a proverb — 
this Moabitish maiden's beautiful and true love, that cared 
nothing for itself, but cared all for the one loved — it has 
sweetened the world ; through four thousand years it has 
syllabled itself in almost every language, and is to-day as 
beautiful and true as it was when first uttered ; and sorry 
am I for anybody that can read these words and keep dry 
eyes. 

" \Yhen she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, then she 
left speaking unto her." 

I know that Naomi was glad, from the very bottom of 
her heart. She counseled her daughters-in-law to return, 
not because she felt that she could spare them, — she longed 
to keep them with her, — but because she thought it was 
best. Hers was ripe love, that showed itself in action. 
Ruth's was love midway, that showed itself not onh^ in 
action but also in words. 

" So they two went until they came to Beth-lehem." 

And now we have the village life indeed. The word that 
comes in at the edge of the neighborhood runs from house 
to house, nobody knows how ; but everybody has found 
out that Naomi has come back. The whole place is in 
excitement. When she went away she was the wife of a 
person of distinction ; she belonged, that is to say, to the 



426 BIBLE STCDIES. 

upper class. The upper class was not very far from the 
bottom, to be sure ; but the upper class is the upper class 
everywhere. 

"And it came to pass, when they were come to Beth-lehem, that all the 
city was moved about them, and they said. Is this Naomi.? And she said 
unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara [Bitter] : for the Almighty 
hath dealt very bitterly with me." 

With us names are mere bell-pulls and door-knockers — 
things hung on a man without any regard to their signifi- 
cance, to distinguish him from his neighbors ; this is the 
case with all nations which are advanced in civilization ; 
but in that primitive age, as also among our American In- 
dians to-day, names were always significant, as they arose 
from external circumstances. You will recollect that pas- 
sage of exceeding pathos where Rachel, in giving birth to 
Benjamin, as her soul was departing ("for she died," the 
narrative says), called his name Ben-oni, Child of my Sor- 
row ; but the father in his pride and joy called him Ben- 
jamin, So7i of my Right hand. So everywhere throughout 
the olden time you will find that names had meanings in 
them. 

And this woman was called Naomi, the Pleasant, the 
Beautiful, the Comely ; but she said, " Do not call me the 
Beautiful any more — call me the Bitter ; for God hath 
dealt bitterly with me." 

** I went out full [with my husband and two sons], and the Lord hath 
brought me home again empty : why then call ye me Naomi, seeing the Lord 
hath testified against me, and the Almighty hath afflicted me ? So Naomi 
returned, and Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, with her, which 
returned out of the country of Moab : and they came to Beth-lehem in the 
beginning of barley harvest." 

That is the first scene in this little drama. Now comes 
the next. 

" Naomi had a kinsman of her husband's, a mighty man of wealth, of the 
family of Elimelech ; and his name was Boaz. And Ruth the Moabitess 
said unto Naomi, Let me now go to the field, and glean ears of corn after 
him in whose sight I shall find grace. And she said unto her, Go, my 
daughter." 

Ruth betook herself to that which she thought would 



NAOMI AND KUriL 427 

support her mother. Her love was not simply sentiment 
— it was life and action ; and she went forth, after the 
manner of that country, to earn her daily bread. 

Now, support there was not very expensive, as we shall 
see by and by,' where a rich man and his laborers would 
sit down contentedly to a meal of parched corn and rice. 
The luxury of such living did not require very severe toil ; 
and yet this was the living of that day even among the 
rich. Now and then, however, there were great feasts, 
which contrasted strongly with the ordinary livelihood. 

"And she went, and came, and gleaned in the field after the reapers : and 
her hap was to light on a part of the field belonging unto Boaz, who was of 
the kindred of Elimelech." 

The redeeme?'^ the defender — such is the original of that 
term kinsma7i. It sprang from the familiar habit of the 
Jewish people by which families were kept together, so that 
when a husband died the wife of the deceased was wedded 
to one of the brothers, or to some of his kindred. Hence 
he became her defender or redeemer. If the husband, 
dying, left landed property and a widow, it was not comely 
for her to marry out of the family connection, thus bring- 
ing another name or strain of blood into the possession of 
that property ; for it was the policy of the Mosaic economy 
to keep the landed property together in certain families or 
tribes. There were what are called levit-ate (brother-in-law) 
marriages, whereby the widow of a son was united to the 
next son. They gave rise, you know, to the question which 
was put to our Sa\^iour, in the New Testament, respecting 
the case in which a woman was married to seven succes- 
sive brothers, and then died, and the question was asked, 
" Whose wife shall she be of the seven ? for they all had 
her." Such a question as that would be impossible to our 
society, in our time ; but among the Jews and in the East 
it fell in entirely with their manners and customs. It 
seemed both decorous and moral to them, though to us it 
would seem monstrous. 

" Behold, Boaz came from Beth-lehem, and said unto the reapers, The 
Lord be with you. And they answered him, The Lord bless thee." 



428 BIBLE STUDIES. 

It was their ordinary mode of salutation. It was beauti- 
ful for the owner of a field to go forth and greet his reap- 
ers thus, and for them to greet him in the same spirit. 
What if a director of a railroad, nowadays, should come 
out in the morning, and say to his workmen, " The Lord 
be with you!" What would they think, or say ? So it 
seems to us' a wonderful period in which the householder 
and master addressed those who served him in these stately 
words, "The Lord be with you,"* and they said in reply, 
"The Lord bless thee." It was a good deal better than 
the best of our salutations. Take, for instance, our " Good- 
bye." That, you know, is " God be with you" — shrunk up 
to a skin. 

" Then said Boaz unto his servant that was set over the reapers [for he 
had eyes in his head], Whose damsel is this ? 

"And the servant that was set over the reapers answered and said, It is 
the Moabitish damsel that came back with Naomi out of the country of 
Moab: and she said, I pray you, let me glean and gather after the reapers 
among the sheaves : so she came, and hath continued even from the morn- 
ing until now, that she tarried a little in the house." 

The custom of gleaning prevails in the East to-day that 
prevailed at that time. In Palestine you will find that 
men are cast in the same mold that they were when Ruth 
and Boaz lived. They talk in the same way. They reap 
in the same way. There has been no change there in the 
methods of agriculture for four thousand years. 

" Then said Boaz unto Ruth, Hearest thou not, my daughter .? Go not to 
glean in another field, neither go from hence, but abide here fast by my 
maidens : let thine eyes ^e on the field that they do reap, and go thou after 
them." 

There is gi\,..t: benignity. "Do not go into any other 
field, where you may not be well treated : stay in my field." 
These rude reapers, gathered from every whither during 
harvest time, were not always select in their language, and 
they doubtless oftentimes had their 'equals in the stray 
women that bound up the sheaves. But Boaz seems to have 
had confidence in his own retainers, and said to Ruth, " Fol- 
low after my maidens." It was her protection that he had 
in mind. 



A'A OMI A A 'D R UTH. 429 

" Have I not charged the young men that they shall not touch thee ? " 
In those far-off times, there was a man with a sensitive 
and delicate nature, and that was Boaz. He could not 
endure to see the rough hand of a coarse fellow slapping 
a woman's shoulders, or pinching her arms, or taking those 
rude liberties that are thought even by some young gentle- 
men in our day to be compatible with refinement. They 
had better turn back and go to school to Boaz. I am 
ashamed of many of the unlicked bears' cubs that pass 
themselves off for men of society at this advanced age of 
the world. Would that they were in the field reaping, 
and that Boaz was over them ! 

"And when thou art athirst, go unto the vessels, and drink of that which 
the young men have drawn. 

" Then she fell on her face, and bowed herself to the ground, and said 
unto him, Why have I found grace in thine eyes, that thou shouldest take 
knowledge of me, seeing I am a stranger ? " 

She was as modest as she was sweet and beautiful. 

"And Boaz answered and said unto her. It hath fully been shewed me, all 
that thou hast done unto thy mother-in-law since the death of thine hus- 
band : and how thou hast left thy father and thy mother, and the land of 
thy nativit}', and art come unto a people which thou knewest not hereto- 
fore." 

There is the history of love over and over and over again. 
The heart that loves lives for love's sake. 

" The Lord recompense thy work, and a full reward be given thee of the 
Lord God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust. Then she 
said, Let me find favor in thy sight, my lord ; for that thou hast comforted 
me, and for that thou hast spoken friendly unto thine handmaid, though I 
be not like unto one of thine handmaidens." 

She shrank from the comparison, and put herself lower 
than his handmaidens. 

"And Boaz said unto her [she won him at every step by her tongue]. At 
mealtime, come thou hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in 
the vinegar. And she sat beside the reapers : and he reached her parched 
corn, and she did eat, and was sufiiced, and left. And when she was risen 
up to glean, Boaz [he could not do enough ; he began to feel very benevo- 
lent] commanded his young men, saying. Let her glean even among the 
sheaves, and reproach her not : and let fall also some of the handfuls of 
purpose for her, and leave them, that she may glean them, and rebuke her 



430 BIBLE STUDIES. 

not. So she gleaned in the field until even, and beat out that she had 
gleaned : and it was about an ephah of barley." 

What an ephah was we do not know, but it is computed 
to have been about fifty-five pounds of wheat. Whatever 
may have been the measure, it was evidently a ver}^ good 
day's gleaning in those simple times. 

That is the second scene — the scene of the field. Next, 
Ruth returned to her mother-in-law. Now, Naomi had 
been a beautiful woman, doubtless, in her youth ; and a 
handsome woman that is good becomes more handsome as 
she grows old. Where the disposition is bad no cosmetics 
can cover it ; and no cosmetics are needed where there is 
goodness. I have no doubt that Naomi was still comely 
and beautiful though she called herself " Mara." 

Nevertheless, good as she was, she was shrewd. A 
mother that has brought up children, and taken care of 
them for a long period, has a very good notion of manage- 
ment ; and Naomi had a most sagacious idea of it. 

"And she [Ruth] took it [the barley] up, and went into the city ; and her 
mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned : and she brought forth, and gave 
to her that she had reserved after she was sufficed." 

She had brought home some of the parched corn. 

"And her mother-in-law said unto her. Where hast thou gleaned to-day ; 
and where wroughtest thou ? Blessed be he that did take knowledge of 
thee. 

"And she shewed her mother-in-law with whom she had wrought, and 
said. The man's name with whom I wrought to-day is Boaz. 

"And Naomi said unto her daughter-in-law, Blessed be he of the Lord, 
who hath not left off his kindness to the living and to the dead. And 
Naomi said unto her, The man is near of kin unto us, one of our next 
kinsmen." 

There was light beginning to dawn on the darkness. 

"And Ruth the Moabitess said. He said unto me also, Thou shalt keep 
fast by my young men, until they have ended all my harvest. And Naomi 
said unto Ruth her daughter-in-law, It is good, my daughter, that thou go 
out with his maidens, that they meet thee not in any other field. 

" So she kept fast by the maidens of Boaz to glean unto the end of barley 
harvest and of wheat harvest ; and dwelt with her mother-in-law." 

Meantime, Naomi kept on thinking^. 



jVA OMI AXD R UTH. 43 1 

" Then Naomi her mother-in-law said unto her, My daughter, shall I not 
seek rest for thee, that it may be well with thee ? And now is not Boaz of 
our kindred [our redeemer] with whose maidens thou wast ? Behold, he 
winnoweth barley to-night in the threshing-floor." 

When the barley was gathered from the sickle into sheaves, 
and threshed out, it was next carried to the winnowing floor ; 
and then it was in the state in which men could steal it, if 
they wished — and there never was a time when somebody 
did not wish to steal. Therefore, it was the custom of the 
husbandman and householder to go down with his family 
and see to the winnowing, and sleep at night where his 
grain was. It was his year's livelihood, his treasure, and 
it must be looked after. Naomi knew the custom ; and 
she said to her daughter-in-law — and there was nothing on 
earth purer, simpler, more righteous, according to the ideas 
and the customs of the country, than the directions given 
her : — 

"Wash thyself, therefore, and anoint thee, and put thy raiment upon 
thee, and get thee down to the floor : but make not thyself known unto the 
man, until he shall have done eating and drinking. And it shall be, when 
he lieth down, that thou shalt mark the place where he shall lie, and thou 
shalt go in, and uncover his feet, and lay thee down ; and he will tell thee 
what thou shalt do." 

To the pure all things are pure. Custom determines 
what is right and wrong in social intercourse. 

"And she said unto her, All that thou sayest unto me I will do. And 
she went down unto the floor, and did according to all that her mother-in- 
law bade her. And when Boaz had eaten and drunk, and his heart was 
merry, he went to lie down at the end of the heap of corn : and she came 
softly, and uncovered his feet, and laid her down. 

"And it came to pass at midnight, that the man was afraid [startled], and 
turned himself : and, behold, a woman lay at his feet. And he said, Who 
art thou ? And she answered, I am Ruth thine handmaid : spread there- 
fore thy skirt over thine handmaid ; for thou art a near kinsman. 

"And he said, Blessed be thou of the Lord, my daughter : for thou hast 
shewed more kindness in the latter end than at the beginning, inasmuch as 
thou followedst not young men, whether poor or rich. And now, my daugh- 
ter, fear not ; I will do to thee all that thou requirest : for all the city of my 
people doth know that tliou art a virtuous woman. And now it is true that 
I am thy near kinsman : howbeit there is a kinsman nearer than I. Tarry 
this night, and it shall be in the morning, that if he will perform unto thee 



432 BIBLE STUDIES. 

the part of a kinsman, well ; let -hini do the kinsman's part : but if he will 
not do the part of a kinsman to thee, then will I do the part of a kinsman 
to thee, as the Lord liveth : lie down until the morning. 

"And she lay at his feet until the morning : and she rose up before one 
could know another. And he said, Let it not be known that a v/oman came 
into the floor [her reputation was dear to him]. Also he said. Bring the 
vail that thou hast upon thee, and hold it. And when she held it, he meas- 
ured six measures of barley, and laid it on her: and she went into the city. 

"And when she came to her mother-in-law, she said [for it was dark, so 
that she could not tell certainly who was coming], Who art thou, my daugh- 
ter ? And she told her all that the man had done to her. And she said. 
These six measures of barley gave he me ; for he said to me, Go not empty 
unto thy mother-in-law. Then said she, Sit still, my daughter, until thou 
know how the matter will fall [She knew that the enchantment of love had 
begun. She had no fear but that Boaz would take the next proper step] : 
for the man will not be in rest, until he have finished the thing this day." 

True ! Wise old woman ! She understood tlie case. 
This was the next scene in the drama. There was a court- 
ship, in fact. It was not Boaz that in the first instance 
courted Ruth ; she courted him. And similar instances 
have been occurring from that day until this — not in words, 
not in obvious ways, but in reality. A look is louder than 
speech. A gesture, a posture, winning sympathy, the very 
exhalation of virtue and of beauty, throw about a man an 
atmosphere of enchantment. Talk of a woman's being 
deprived of the privileges of approach ! A true woman, 
with a great heart, emits an influence such that whoever 
comes within it is transfigured in all that he sees, and she 
walks a goddess before him. 

Now comes the fourth scene, which reveals the manners 
and customs of the times. We have disclosed the method 
by which the transfer of property by levirate marriage took 
place. 

" Then went Boaz up to the gate, and sat him down there." 

They had no newspapers in those days. No notice was 
given. There was no probate court ; nor was there any 
surrogate. Men settled their property transactions in a 
very simple way. Mahlon and Chilion had died. They 
had been heirs, in their lifetime, to certain landed property 
which belonged to their father Elimelech. The widows of 



NAOMI AXD RUTH. 



433 



Mahlon and Chilion of course had a certain right to that 
real estate according to the Levitical law ; and there must 
be some plan by which they should be brought back by 
marriage into the family. They could not marry into any 
neighboring tribe without hazarding the family's owner- 
ship of the land that was possessed by their deceased hus- 
bands. There must be some kinsman to marry them. So 
Boaz went up and sat in the gate. He was his own officer, 
his own newspaper, his own court, and his own crier. 

"And behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spake came by [They are never 
\\\ a hurry in the East : they could sit dowii and wait till those they wanted 
came along] ; unto whom he said, Ho, such a one ! turn aside, sit down 
here. 

"And he turned aside, and sat down. And he took ten men of the elders 
of the city, and said, Sit ye down here. And they sat down [In that hot 
climate men are always willing to sit]. And he said unto the kinsman, 
Naomi, that is come again out of the country of Moab, selleth a parcel of 
land, which was our brother Elimelech's : and I thought to advertise thee, 
saying, Buy it before the inhabitants, and before the elders of my people. 
If thou wilt redeem it, redeem it : but if thou wilt not redeem it, then tell 
me, that I may know : for there is none to redeem it beside thee : and I 
am after thee. 

"And he said, I will redeem it. 

" Then said Boaz, What day thou buyest the field of the hand of Naomi, 
thou must buy it also of Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise 
up the name of the dead upon his inheritance." 

This kinsman evidently had not seen Ruth. She had 
not been reaping in his field, had not lain at his feet, had 
not eaten of his parched corn, and had not drunk of his 
wine. 

"And the kinsman said, I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I mar mine 
own inheritance : redeem thou my right to thyself; for I cannot redeem it. 
Now this was the manner in former time in Israel concerning redeeming 
and concerning changing, for to confirm all things; a man plucked off his 
shoe, and gave it to his neighbor : and this was a testimony in Israel. 
Therefore the kinsman said unto Boaz, Buy it for thee. So he drew off his 
shoe. 

"And Boaz said unto the elders, and unto all the people, Ye are wit- 
nesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech's and all that was 
Chilion's and Mahlon's, of the hand of Naomi. Moreover Ruth the Moab- 
itess, the wife of Mahlon, have I purchased to be my wife, to raise up the 
name of the dead upon his inheritance, that the name of the dead be not cut 
2S 



434 BIBLE STUDIES. 

off from among his brethren, and from the gate of his place : ye are wit- 
nesses this day. And all the people that were in the gate, and the elders, 
said. We are witnesses. The Lord make the woman that is come into 
thine house like Rachel and like Leah, which two did build the house of 
Israel : and do thou worthily in Ephratah, and be famous in Beth-lehem : 
and let thy house be like the house of Pharez, whom Tamar bare unto 
Judah, of the seed which the Lord shall give thee of this young woman. 

" So Boaz took Ruth, and she was his wife : and when he went in unto 
her, the Lord gave her conception, and she bare a son. And the women 
said unto Naomi, Blessed be the Lord, which hath not left thee this day 
without a kinsman, that his name may be famous in Israel. And he shall 
be unto thee a restorer of thy life, and a nourisher of thine old age : for thy 
daughter-in-law, which loveth thee, which is better to thee than seven sons, 
hath borne him. 

"And Naomi took the child, and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse 
unto it. And the women her neighbors gave it a name, saying. There is 
a son born to Naomi ; and they called his name Obed : he is the father of 
Jesse, the father of David." 

And David stood in the ancestry of the Lord Jesus 
Christ ; and he who is the Saviour of the whole world had 
thus mingled with his blood the blood of the Moabites, — 
though not alone through this strain, but through many 
others. 

There are a great many things that may be said about 
that history. When this family went down into the land 
of Moab they were driven out of their own land by famine ; 
and it was bad luck. When they got there Elimelech died ; 
— bad luck again. After a little while the sons, being mar- 
ried, died ; — bad luck still. Naomi, stripped of everything, 
denuded, a widow and a stranger, wandered back to her 
former home ; — could anything be more dismal ? And yet, 
these were the very steps by which she came into pros- 
perity, not only into the re-establishment of herself in the 
household, but into the possession of the property of her 
ancestors. It teaches us the lesson that, when troubles 
come, if we bear them patiently we may be led out of 
them. It is God's way, to lead men out of trouble into 
brightness. If one has been struck by misfortune, let him 
not sink down under it, but remember that it may be one 
of the instrumentalities by which God is leading him to a 
greater prosperity. 



A 'A OMI A ND R lITli. 4 3 % 

I want to say a word here in respect to Naomi. She was 
a mother-in-law. Ever since men were born mothers-in- 
law have been at a discount. And yet, I should like to 
know how a man is going to have a wife if there are to be 
no mothers-in-law ! And is it not time that there should 
be held up before men the true idea of this relation ? I 
should like to know if there have not been more mothers- 
in-law blessed and harmonious than mothers-in-law dis- 
cordant and evil. Do you know what a mother is ? Do 
you know the days and months during which she carries 
the unborn babe, giving her very blood for its nourish- 
ment ? Do you know the gate of outcry and anguish 
through which the child is born ? Do you know how 
again the mother gives herself as the very food of the son 
or daughter over whom she rejoices ? Do you know how 
many times the nights are turned into days in her watch- 
fulness ? Do you know how tired she often becomes from 
taking double labor upon herself for the child's sake ? Do 
you know how impossible it is in sickness, though she may 
be more sick than the child, to w^eary her of care for it ? 
Do you know how patient she is in her efforts to develop 
the boy or the girl ? As she trains him or her, what fabrics 
of courage she weaves ! what visions of hope she forms ! 
what ambitions she conceives ! what sacrifices she makes ! 
How she rolls everything in life over upon her blessed son, 
proud of his growth in all that is good, exulting in his 
honor, and happy in his love ! And when at last he comes 
to years of majority, and selects the partner of his life, the 
mother stands still to see him carried away by another, to 
see another take her place in his regard, to see herself dis- 
possessed, for tlie time being, of the enthusiasm and the 
affection that once were hers ; and it is not strange that 
there should be in the heart of even the best woman on 
earth a little rebellion under such circumstances. 

Yet, mother, be patient ! When children are married, 
and go away from home, they may be for a while absorbed 
in their new experiences ; but as soon as cares and troubles 
overtake them you may be sure that they will come back, 



43^ BIBLE SIVDIES. 

with more love and trust for you, and more need of you, 
than ever before. It is not to be wondered at, when a 
mother sees that for which she has given her life taken 
possession of by one that has not done a thing for it except 
in the coinage of God's mint of love, that she should pro- 
test for a season ; and it is for the daughter-in-law^ to 
remember the feelings of the mother-in-law, and not ever- 
lastingly think that the mother-in-law should remember 
the feelings of the one that has come into the family. It is 
true that there are some proud and selfish mothers-in-law ; 
and it is just as true that there are some proud and selfish 
daughters-in-law, as there are some proud and selfish chil- 
dren. And let me say that I think some of the most beau- 
tiful examples I have ever known in life have been those of 
the disinterested love of mothers to those that have come 
newly into the household — to sons' wives and daughters' 
husbands that have not been at first lovely, but have been 
made so by the all-embracing goodness of the mother-in- 
law. 

One of the most delightful tributes paid to the mother- 
in-law that I ever heard was that of one of our foremost 
men,* who is highly respected, and who, on his wedding 
night said to the mother of his bride, " Mother, I never 
before knew how much Adam was to be pitied, who, in the 
nature of things, could not have had a mother-in-law." 

Surely, Naomi was a lovely specimen of the mother-in- 
law ; and her name ought to redeem from unmerited re- 
proach this much-abused class of women. 

Is it strange that the little fountain head of the streams 
that flowed, in this line of descent, to form the flood that 
at last came forth in the Lord Jesus Christ, should have 
been composed of such characters as Ruth and David ? 
And might it not be expected — from the merely human 
side, even — that, with such an ancestry, he would make a 



* Since he has recently passed away, honored, beloved, and regretted by 
the whole nation, it may not be improper to state that this was George 
William Curtis. — Editor, 



A^AOMI AND RUTH. 437 

grand prophet in Israel; and bring forth such perfect fruit 
as appeared in him ? 

After the roar of battle, when the army is removed from 
the field, and the hospital is abandoned ; when the soldiers 
have gone home, and have been greeted, with music, with 
social exhilaration, with the ringing of bells, with lights in 
the windows ; when there is joy in every home, and they 
have settled down into domestic peace, how strange is that 
peace in contrast with the rude alarms of war ! 

Out of the turbulent times, the dark days, of the Judges 
through which we have been finding our way, upon what 
have we come ? This sweet idyl of Ruth, in which, from 
beginning to end, there is no discord ; in which peace flows 
unbrokenly ; and in which are manifested the purest feel- 
ings of patriotism and of love. The whole flow of the 
narrative is idyllic, pastoral, peaceful, beautiful. Its sen- 
tences sound in our ears, after we are done reading them, 
as the bell in the belfry still warbles through the air long 
after the tongue has ceased to strike. We leave it as a vis- 
ion of beauty, a rare picture, an exquisite portrayal, made 
more beautiful because it comes from the thunder of war, 
and is interjected into the rude manners and gross moral- 
ity of a far-removed age — beautiful as poetry, beautiful as 
a drama, and yet more admirable as a truth of history. 

And now we may turn back and say. Good-bye, Samson, 
good-bye, Jephthah, good-bye, Benjamin, good-bye, Gideon, 
good-bye, Balak, good-bye, all you great swart, uncombed, 
harsh, mighty men, fitted for times of convulsion and revo- 
lution! Having said farewell to them, and passed through 
the lovelier scenes of Ruth, we have set our face forward 
toward the times of Samuel and Saul, and shall begin to 
behold the light of David's day and the Solomonic glory. 
I hope to be able at a future time to take up again the 
wonderful history from this point, and then I shall rejoice 
as the watcher rejoices who has waited through the night, 
and sees upon the horizon the first beams of twilight — the 
harbinger of day. 



43^ BIBLE STUDIES, 

We have come to the close of this series of informal 
readings in the Jewish Scriptur.es of the Old Covenant. 
The term Jew has been a word of contempt. Among the 
Jews, as among us, there are disreputable classes. There 
never was a sea so pure that there was not mud at the 
bottom of it ; and there never w^as a race so pure that 
there was not a muddy class within it : but this Hebrew 
nation have brought to us many virtues, many sublime 
qualities that belong to manhood ; and as long as the Old 
Testament endures we ought to be grateful to it, and to the 
authors of it, for those sources and fountains of moral in- 
fluence which have enhanced our prosperity. I declare to 
you that we have not got all the honey out of the lion 
yet ; we have not yet plucked all the flowers nor gathered 
all the grapes that grow on the vines of the Old Testa- 
ment. When we walk up and down through its pages, no 
longer tied by a superstitious theory of verbal inspiration, 
and with freedom bring our reason to bear, and, as eman- 
cipated men, discriminate between truth and error, right 
and wrong, we shall have much to harvest out of this 
book. We shall learn much that will be of comfort to 
us in trial. We shall learn much of what the father is or 
ought to be to the family, and the citizen to the state. 
We shall learn many lessons of wisdom adapted to children, 
and to the young people when they set up for themselves. 
It is a book full of the most precious and sacred memories. 
It is a record of the experiences of four thousand years. It 
contains the best thoughts of the best men that the world 
has ever seen. 

Stand, then, for the Word of God. Make it a light to 
your path and a lamp to your feet. Let it be your guide 
in the way of righteousness. Live by it, and die in its hope. 



THE END. 



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l^ale Hectares on ipreacbinG* 

By henry ward BEECHER. 

\^^ Lyman Beecher Lectureship,'' Yale Theological Seminary^ 



THREE VOLUMES IK ONE. 



The First, Second and Third Series were at first published sepa- 
rately, aggregating $4.25 in price, and in that form sold nearly 20,000 
volumes. The present edition groups the three series in one volume^ at 
$2.00, thus bringing this most helpful and famous work within the 
reach of all. 



FIRST SERIES : Personal Elements. 

What is Preaching? Qualifications of the Preacher: The Personal Element 
in Oratory: The S udy of Human Nature: The Psychological Working Ele- 
ments: Rhetorical Drill and General Training: Rhetorical Illustrations: 
Healthy as Related to Preaching: Sermon-Making: Love, the Central Element 
0/ the Christian Ministry. 

SECOND SERIES : Social and Religious Machinery. 

Choosing the Field: Prayer: The Prayer Meeting: its Methods and Bene- 
fits: The Prayer Meetitig: its Helps and Hindrances: Relations of Music to 
Worship: Development of Social Elements; BibleClasses^ Mission Schools, Lay 
Work: The Philosophy of Revivals: Revivals Subject to Law: The Cofiduct of 
Revivals: Bringing Men to Christ. 

THIRD SERIES : Methods of Using Christian Doctrines. 

The Preacher's Book: How to Use the Bible: The True Method of Presettt- 
ing God: Conception of the Divinity: Practical Use of the Divine Ideal: The 
Manifei>tation of God through Christ: Views of the Divine Life in Hitman 
Conditions: Sins and Sinfulness: The Sense of Personal Sin: The Growth of 
Christian Life: Christian Manhood; Life and Immortality. 



" Of intense interest to every minis- 
ter.''''— Watck7nan (Baptist). 

"Every Theological student, young 
minister. Bible-class teacher and laborer 
in mission-work, will be profited by the 
study of this thoughtful and interesting 
book."— The Episcopalian (Philadel- 
phia). 

" No homiletic advices can be more 
practical, as none can be more exhilar- 
ating."— C/irz.y//«w Register (Unitarian, 
Boston). 

" No other mian could have combined 
so much of the genuine gospel method 
of teaching and preaching into one 
voinme.'^— Methodist Recorder (Pitt-s- 
burgh). 



"Characteristically sagacious, sensi- 
ble, earnest, brilliant, witty and wise." 
Chicago Advance (Congregationalist), 

"No preacher or Christian worker 
but will benefit himself and others by a 
knowledge of the principles and n\eth- 
ods of one of the foremost preachers of 
the day." — Sunday School T^zw^j (Phila- 
delphia). 

" The secrets of successful^ pulpit 
work as explained by one of its Ta2iS- 
ters.'"— Baltimore Presbyterian. 

"Many of the sources of his extraor- 
dinary power are clearly set forth in 
these characteristic lectures." — New 
York Observer. 



FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, New York. 



H trainable fIDemoriaL 



A SUMMER IN ENGLAND 

WITH 

HENRY WARD BEECHER. 

Giving Seventeen Sermons, four Popular Lectures [" The Reign <j{ 
the Common People," *' The Wastes and Burden of Society," "Con- 
science," and " Evolution and Religion." never before published] and 
eight Special Addresses, delivered by him in Great Britain during the 
season of 1886; with an Account of the lour, expressions of British 
Public Opinion, and Personal Reminiscences. Edited by James B. 
Pond, Mr Beecher's business manager and traveling companion. 

Crown 8vo, 702 pp Artotype Portrait (1887) and 7 pp Autograph 
Fac-simile of MS. Notes. Garnet cloth, gilt top, $2. 



" Valuable records [this, and the 
Speeches ia England, 1863] of the great 
orator's two very memorable visits to 
the Mother Country— the first a national 
service, the last a personal gratificd- 
tion, such as fall to the experience of 
few men."— 7726? iVat'on (N. Y.). 

"The 'Summer' beiag the last of 
Mr. Beecher's life, and the work he did 
in his 'vacation' being almost as won- 
derful in amount and in influence as any 
of his earlier life ''—The Critic (N. Y.) 

"The' Reign of the Commna People,' 
one of the lectures most called for in 
England, is the best thin^- Beecher ever 
put to the consideration of a thinking 
man." — Providence Journal. 



" They have almost the solemnity and 
value of ' last words.' It was the gath- 
ering of strength and eloquence before 
the days of silence." — Phil Ledger, 

" The narrative is simple, straight- 
forward, and full of interesting personal 
reminiscences. . . . The volume re- 
flects great credit upon its editor." — 
Bo ton Homr Jou-i-nal. 

" A fertility of intellectual production 
on the highest lines of forensic labor 
without parallel." The Ckurch^nan. 

■' The triumphal progress was a fitting 
climax to a remarkable career."— /^^^rif- 
land Transcript. 



By 



HIS ONLY NOVEL. 

NORWOOD : A Tale of Village Life in New England 

Henry Ward Beecher. 

When Robert Bonner asked Mr. Beecher to write a story for 
the New York Ledger, the clergyman replied that he had no hesita- 
tion about doing it if he thougkt he could, and added: 

" Scott did not write till he was over forty. Who knows but I may turn out a 
great novelist, and have it said when I am dead : After this distinguished nov- 
elist (who also sometimes preached) was fifty years old, he was found out by 
Robert Bonner to have a turn for fiction, etc., etc." 

The el?ect of this story on the circu- I "Embodies more of the high art of 
lation of the Ledger justified Mr. Bon- ' fiction than any half-dozen (;f the best 
ner's sagacity and enterprise; and when I novels of the best authors of the day. 
it was afterwards issued in book form, it It will bear to be read and re-read as 
very shortly sold over 60,000 copies. It often as Dickens' ' Dombey' or ' David 



has ever since remained a favorite with 
those who delight in the purity and 
beauty, the shrewd wit and homely 
wisdom, the quaint and sterling char- 
acters and the genuine rural loveliness 
of New England life. 



Copperfield.' " — Albany Evening Jour- 
nal. 

" Wholesome and delightful, to be 
ta'icen up again and yet again with fresh 
pleasure." — Chicago Standard, 



FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, New York. 



PLYMOUTH PULPIT SERMONS 



BY 



HENRY WARD BEECHER 

Four Volumes, covering the period from Sept. 1873 to Sept. 1875. 

About boo pp. each, Garnet Cloth, %i.^o per vol. 



"The late HENRY WARD BEECHER was, take him all 
in all, the most remarkable preacher and orator of this gener- 
ation. His fertility of mind was inexhaustible. The publish- 
ers have rendered a public service in reprinting in a convenient 
form these sermons. . . . Printed on good paper and in 
good type, they are issued at a price which will put them 
within the reach of hundreds of young ministers and thous- 
ands of laymen, who retain their relish for original and vigorous 
thought presented with fervid eloquence." — Neio York 
Evangelist. 



Vol, I, — Religion in Daily Life ; Forelookings ; Hei'oism ; New Testa 
ment Theory of Evolution ; The Atoning God ; Prayer; Man's Two Natures ; 
All-Sidedness in Christian Life ; Fact and Fancy ; Cuba; Moral Teaching of 
Suff^ering; How Goes the Battle ? Nature of Christ ; Working and Waiting ; 
What is Christ to Me? Science nf Right Living ; Religiotis Constancy; Soul 
Power; Riches of God ; St. Paurs Creed ; The Departed Christ ; Naturalness 
of Faith ; Spiritual Manhood ; The Debt of Strength ; Special Providence ; 
Keeping the Faith. 

Vol, II, — Charles Sumner ; Saved by Hope; The Priniacy of Love ; 
Foretokens of Resurrectio7i ; Sutnmer in the Soul; Hindering Christianity ; 
Soul-Relationship ; Christiaji foy fulness ; Liberty in the Churches ; The 
Temperance Question ; God''s Grace; Ideal Christianity ; Problem of Life ; 
Unjust Jzcdgnie7its ; hnmortality of Good Works; The Universal Heart of 
God; Delight of Self-Sacrifice ; Truth Speaking; The Secret of the Cross; 
Resolving and Doing ; Triumph of Goodness ; Following Christ; Prayer and 
Providence; What is Religion? Christian Sympathy ; Luminous Hours. 

Vol, III, — Law and Liberty ; Faint-Heartedness ; As a Little Child ; 
God's Will; Present use of Inzmortality ; The Test of Church Worth; Peace 
inChrist; The Indwelling of Christ ; The End and the Means ; Saved by Grace; 
Soul-Rest; The World's Growth; Foundation Work; The Bible; The Work 
of Patience ; Divine Love ; Unworthy Pursuits ; True Righteo7isness ; Things 
of the Spirit; Christian Contentment ; Moral Standards ; Trials of Faith , 
Old Paths ; Meekness, a Power ; Extent of the Divine Law ; Soul-Growth. 

Vol. \^ ,— Christ Life ; The Courtesy of Conscience ; Love, the Key to 
Religion; Christianity Social ; Morality and Religion ; Law of Soul-Growth ; 
Sources and Uses of Suffering; God's Dear Children; Grieving the Spirit; 
Working and Waiting; The Sure Foundation; Nurture of Noble Imp7iise , 
Sowing and Reaping ; Soul Statistics; Secret oj' Christ's Power ; The Com- 
7nunion of Saints ; Christian Life a Struggle ; The Prodigal Son; Unii^e^-- 
sality of the Gospel ; Ecofiomy in Small Things; Good Deeds Memorable; 
Divine Indwelling; Claims of the Spirit; The Kingdom Within; The New 
Birth ; Perfection Through Love. 

RECENT OPINIONS. 



"They cover the period of Mr. 
Beecher's deepest trouble, 1873-1875, 
and the period in which his preaching 
had perhaps the ripest thought and the 
deepMCSt spiritual life, . . . the rip- 
est and best portion of his ministry."— 
The Christian Union. 



' 'As one turns these wonderful pages, 
it is hard to think that the mind which 
speaks through them with such ever 
fresh power to interest, and often with 
such tremendous vitality and suasivc 
strength, has ceased to act on earth." 
— The Congregationalist, Boston. 



FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, New York. 



Evolution and Religion. 

By henry ward BEECHER. 

" PART I. Theoretical and FundamentaL — Eight Sermons dis 
cussing the bearings of the Evolutionary Philosophy on the executive 
doctrines of Evangelical Christianity. Paper, 60 cents* 

hiiroductory: The Signs of the Times: Evolution in Hurttan Consciousness 
of the Idea of God: The Two Revelations: The Inspiration of the Bible: The 
Sinfulness of Man: The New Birth: Divine Providence and Design: Evolution 
and th e Ch urch. 

PART II. Practical and Vital.— Eighteen Sermons, with ap- 
plications of the Eyolutionary Philosophy to religious thought and life. 
Paper, $1, 

Introductory: The Background of Mystery: The Manifold Christ: The 
Conversion of Force: The Drift of the Ages: The Hidden Man: The Rest of 
God: God's Loving Providence: New Testament Theory of Evolution: God''s 
Goodness Man's Salvation: Poverty and the Gospel: God in the World: Jesus 
the True Ideal: The Growth of Creation: The Battle of Life: The Liberty of 
Christ: Concord, not Unison: The Liberty and Duty of the Pulpit: The Vitality 
of God's Truth. 



Parts I and II, bound together in Cloth, 
440 pages, $1,50, 



" The spell of Mr. Beecher's genius 
has never been more powerfully exerted 
than in these sermons. His imagination 
w^as never more fervid and creative, nor 
his rhetoric finer. One is amazed at 
the sustained intellectual vigor that at 
so advanced an age is still so fresh and 
productive. ' ' — L iving Ch ^r^-^, Chicago. 

"His intellectual vigor has never 
been questioned, and many will read 
with interest what he here puts forth as 
the matured convictions of a lifetime 
devoted to the study of the subjects 
herein treated."— 6"rt« Francisco Bul- 
letin. 

" He casts upon the great funda- 
mental doctrines of the Church, in suc- 
cussion, the light of the Evolutionary 
theory; and those who felt assured be- 
fore of their firm foundation, must yet 
confess that they take on new beauty 
and meaning under this light, while 
many will owe to this illumination no 
less than the renewal of a lost belief." 
Sacramento Record-Union. 



" The discourses [Sermons in Part I 'I 
are clear, sober, solid thought. Each 
link in the chain is complete and per- 
fect in \iSG.\i.''' — Cornell Revie^v. 

"Everyone [Sermons in Part II ^ is 
full and overflowing with stimulating 
thought, fresh views of great truths 
grown stale by monotony of iteration, 
inspiring impulses and strong mount- 
ings of devotion toward God, earnest 
benevolence and goodwill toward man, 
loyalty to Christ, — and in fact a gospel 
of good sense and hopeful Christianity, 
wrought out of a reverent study of 
God's ways of working in nature — 
physical, social, mental, moral, and 
spiritual." — Providence Star. 

" It seems to me you keep all the 
most choice and precious things, only 
placing them on the right foundation; 
and how they can stand much longer on 
the old foundation I do not see. . . . 
Surely your book will bring light to 
many." — From a Presbyterian Clergy- 



FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, New York. 



IRotable an& Unteresting IRelfQious BooFis. 



Signs of Promise. 

Sermons Preached in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, 1887-1889. 

By LYMAN ABBOTT, D.D. 

Eighteen Jyiscourses. 12mo, cloth, gilt top. Price, $1.50. 

" ' Signs of Promise' is the fit title of the first volume of sermons 
preached in Plymouth Pulpit since its greatest occupant passed from 
earth. By all logical and intellectual inheritance, that pulpit is now 
worthily filled. . . . The Plymouth preacher of to-day shows us 
that God is, and not merely that he was. His words thrill with the 
currents of hope born of a survey of the past and making contact v/ith 

the unseen future All of these sermons are strong, helpful and 

suggestive, and reveal the true prophet." — The Critic, New York. 

thor's theology; one may be a Buddhist 



" Clear and compact, and palpitate 
with the influences of the time. . . . One 
cannot read these sermons without be- 
ing impressed with the ability with 
which the subjects are handled, and 
with many glowing passages which are 
eminently spiritual and uplifting;" — 
*Skiistiaii Intelligcnce-r, New York. 

•' One of the favorite assertions of that 
supremely irritating created thing, the 
infidel who has not sufficient strength of 
mind to believe in aught but himself, is 
that Christianity is behind the times, is 
incapable of grappling with the prob- 
lems of every-day life, and, indeed, 
blinds itself to their existence; and as 
this kind of infidel is common, and his 
cuckoo cry is all but continuous, it is a 
pleasure now and then to encounter a 
volum.e of sermons showing the keenest 
sensitiveness to current topics of inter- 
est. One need not agree v.'ith the au- 



or a Mohammedan and yet enjoy the 
manner in which such an one will at- 
tack and rout this species of infidel.'" — 
Boston Herald. 

" Dr. Abbott is no copyist, but a man 
strong in his own peculiar powers and 
gifts. ' ' — Ch ristia n Register. 

" Full of earnest and vigorous thought 
and are eminently stimulating. Even 
those who do not altogether agree with 
the author's theological positions will 
lird much to be admired here and little 
to be condemned." — Congregationalist. 

"A clew to Dr. Abbott's Beecher-like 
reception of all revelation, in Scripture 
nature or life, and to his ability to keep 
abreast with tlie stream of such revela- 
tion as it widens continually between 
the opposite but not opposing banks 
of theology and science.''' — Brooklyr 
Eagle. 



Spirit and Life. 

Thoughts for To-Day. 
By AMORY H. BRADFORD, D.D., 

First Cong. Church, 3Iontclair, N. J. 
Twelve Discourses. 16mo, vellum cloth. I'rice, $1»00. 

" It is evident to the laical mind that a certain tender, serious, hu- 
mane spirit possesses men of this class, urging them to work for the 
good of man and the glory of God in nobler fashion, broader ways, than 
purely metaphysical schemes can ever hope to instigate." — Boston Post. 

"We commend his volume heartily to 
those of our readers who desire to get 
an appreciative and wholly uncontro- 
versial interpretation of the Bible which 
God is writing continuously in human 
hearts."- The Christian Union, N. Y. 

'• Rarely has there been published in 
this country a finer volume of sermons, 
of sermons more worthy of publication, 



or better fitted to be of actual helpful 
ness to Christian thought and the spirit 
ual life.'' — Tfie Advance., Chicago. 

"The best modern preaching deals 
with spiritual wants and vital truths. 
Judged by this test, the sermons before 
us are worthy to be classed among the 
best sermons of the day."— A^^-w Eng 
la7ider and Yale Review. 



FORDS, HOWARD, & HULBERT, New York. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

019 971 860 5 






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